MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC, 1555-1566, Complete

A History

By JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

Corresponding Member of the Institute of France, Etc. 

1855

[Etext Editor's Note: JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, born in Dorchester, Mass. 1814, died 1877. Other works: Morton's Hopes and Merry Mount, novels. Motley was the United States Minister to Austria, 1861-67, and the UnitedStates Minister to England, 1869-70. Mark Twain mentions his respect forJohn Motley. Oliver Wendell Holmes said in 'An Oration delivered beforethe City Authorities of Boston' on the 4th of July, 1863: "'It cannot bedenied, '--says another observer, placed on one of our nationalwatch-towers in a foreign capital, --'it cannot be denied that thetendency of European public opinion, as delivered from high places, ismore and more unfriendly to our cause; but the people, ' he adds, 'everywhere sympathize with us, for they know that our cause is that offree institutions, --that our struggle is that of the people against anoligarchy. ' These are the words of the Minister to Austria, whosegenerous sympathies with popular liberty no homage paid to his genius bythe class whose admiring welcome is most seductive to scholars has everspoiled; our fellow-citizen, the historian of a great Republic whichinfused a portion of its life into our own, --John Lothrop Motley. " (Seethe biography of Motley, by Holmes) Ed. ]

PREFACE

The rise of the Dutch Republic must ever be regarded as one of theleading events of modern times. Without the birth of this greatcommonwealth, the various historical phenomena of: the sixteenth andfollowing centuries must have either not existed; or have presentedthemselves under essential modifications. --Itself an organized protestagainst ecclesiastical tyranny and universal empire, the Republic guardedwith sagacity, at many critical periods in the world's history; thatbalance of power which, among civilized states; ought always to beidentical with the scales of divine justice. The splendid empire ofCharles the Fifth was erected upon the grave of liberty. It is aconsolation to those who have hope in humanity to watch, under the reignof his successor, the gradual but triumphant resurrection of the spiritover which the sepulchre had so long been sealed. From the handbreadth ofterritory called the province of Holland rises a power which wages eightyyears' warfare with the most potent empire upon earth, and which, duringthe progress of the struggle, becoming itself a mighty state, and bindingabout its own slender form a zone of the richest possessions of earth, from pole to tropic, finally dictates its decrees to the empire ofCharles. 

So much is each individual state but a member of one great internationalcommonwealth, and so close is the relationship between the whole humanfamily, that it is impossible for a nation, even while struggling foritself, not to acquire something for all mankind. The maintenance of theright by the little provinces of Holland and Zealand in the sixteenth, byHolland and England united in the seventeenth, and by the United Statesof America in the eighteenth centuries, forms but a single chapter in thegreat volume of human fate; for the so-called revolutions of Holland, England, and America, are all links of one chain. 

To the Dutch Republic, even more than to Florence at an earlier day, isthe world indebted for practical instruction in that great science ofpolitical equilibrium which must always become more and more important asthe various states of the civilized world are pressed more closelytogether, and as the struggle for pre-eminence becomes more feverish andfatal. Courage and skill in political and military combinations enabledWilliam the Silent to overcome the most powerful and unscrupulous monarchof his age. The same hereditary audacity and fertility of genius placedthe destiny of Europe in the hands of William's great-grandson, andenabled him to mould into an impregnable barrier the various elements ofopposition to the overshadowing monarchy of Louis XIV. As the schemes ofthe Inquisition and the unparalleled tyranny of Philip, in one century, led to the establishment of the Republic of the United Provinces, so, inthe next, the revocation of the Nantes Edict and the invasion of Hollandare avenged by the elevation of the Dutch stadholder upon the throne ofthe stipendiary Stuarts. 

To all who speak the English language; the history of the great agonythrough which the Republic of Holland was ushered into life must havepeculiar interest, for it is a portion of the records of the Anglo-Saxonrace--essentially the same, whether in Friesland, England, orMassachusetts. 

A great naval and commercial commonwealth, occupying a small portion ofEurope but conquering a wide empire by the private enterprise of tradingcompanies, girdling the world with its innumerable dependencies in Asia, America, Africa, Australia--exercising sovereignty in Brazil, Guiana, theWest Indies, New York, at the Cape of Good Hope, in Hindostan, Ceylon, Java, Sumatra, New Holland--having first laid together, as it were, manyof the Cyclopean blocks, out of which the British realm, at a late:period, has been constructed--must always be looked upon with interest byEnglishmen, as in a great measure the precursor in their own scheme ofempire. 

For America the spectacle is one of still deeper import. The DutchRepublic originated in the opposition of the rational elements of humannature to sacerdotal dogmatism and persecution--in the courageousresistance of historical and chartered liberty to foreign despotism. Neither that liberty nor ours was born of the cloud-embraces of a falseDivinity with, a Humanity of impossible beauty, nor was the infant careerof either arrested in blood and tears by the madness of its worshippers. "To maintain, " not to overthrow, was the device of the Washington of thesixteenth century, as it was the aim of our own hero and his greatcontemporaries. 

The great Western Republic, therefore--in whose Anglo-Saxon veins flowsmuch of that ancient and kindred blood received from the nation onceruling a noble portion of its territory, and tracking its own politicalexistence to the same parent spring of temperate human liberty--must lookwith affectionate interest upon the trials of the elder commonwealth. These volumes recite the achievement of Dutch independence, for itsrecognition was delayed till the acknowledgment was superfluous andridiculous. The existence of the Republic is properly to be dated fromthe Union of Utrecht in 1581, while the final separation of territoryinto independent and obedient provinces, into the Commonwealth of theUnited States and the Belgian provinces of Spain, was in reality effectedby William the Silent, with whose death three years subsequently, theheroic period of the history may be said to terminate. At this pointthese volumes close. Another series, with less attention to minutedetails, and carrying the story through a longer range of years, willpaint the progress of the Republic in its palmy days, and narrate theestablishment of, its external system of dependencies and its interiorcombinations for self-government and European counterpoise. The lessonsof history and the fate of free states can never be sufficiently ponderedby those upon whom so large and heavy a responsibility for themaintenance of rational human freedom rests. 

I have only to add that this work is the result of conscientiousresearch, and of an earnest desire to arrive at the truth. I havefaithfully studied all the important contemporary chroniclers and laterhistorians--Dutch, Flemish, French, Italian, Spanish, or German. Catholicand Protestant, Monarchist and Republican, have been consulted with thesame sincerity. The works of Bor (whose enormous but indispensable foliosform a complete magazine of contemporary state-papers, letters, andpamphlets, blended together in mass, and connected by a chain of artlessbut earnest narrative), of Meteren, De Thou, Burgundius, Heuterus;Tassis, Viglius, Hoofd, Haraeus, Van der Haer, Grotius-of Van der Vynckt, Wagenaer, Van Wyn, De Jonghe, Kluit, Van Kampen, Dewez, Kappelle, Bakhuyzen, Groen van Prinsterer--of Ranke and Raumer, have been asfamiliar to me as those of Mendoza, Carnero, Cabrera, Herrera, Ulloa, Bentivoglio, Peres, Strada. The manuscript relations of those Argus-eyedVenetian envoys who surprised so many courts and cabinets in their mostunguarded moments, and daguerreotyped their character and policy for theinstruction of the crafty Republic, and whose reports remain such aninestimable source for the secret history of the sixteenth century, havebeen carefully examined--especially the narratives of the caustic andaccomplished Badovaro, of Suriano, and Michele. It is unnecessary to addthat all the publications of M. Gachard--particularly the invaluablecorrespondence of Philip II. And of William the Silent, as well as the"Archives et Correspondence" of the Orange Nassau family, edited by thelearned and distinguished Groen van Prinsterer, have been my constantguides through the tortuous labyrinth of Spanish and Netherland politics. The large and most interesting series of pamphlets known as "The DuncanCollection, " in the Royal Library at the Hague, has also afforded a greatvariety of details by which I have endeavoured to give color and interestto the narrative. Besides these, and many other printed works, I havealso had the advantage of perusing many manuscript histories, among whichmay be particularly mentioned the works of Pontua Payen, of Renom deFrance, and of Pasquier de la Barre; while the vast collection ofunpublished documents in the Royal Archives of the Hague, of Brussels, and of Dresden, has furnished me with much new matter of greatimportance. I venture to hope that many years of labour, a portion ofthem in the archives of those countries whose history forms the object ofmy study, will not have been entirely in vain; and that the lovers ofhuman progress, the believers in the capacity of nations forself-government and self-improvement, and the admirers of disinterestedhuman genius and virtue, may find encouragement for their views in thedetailed history of an heroic people in its most eventful period, and inthe life and death of the great man whose name and fame are identicalwith those of his country. 

No apology is offered for this somewhat personal statement. When anunknown writer asks the attention of the public upon an important theme, he is not only authorized, but required, to show, that by industry andearnestness he has entitled himself to a hearing. The author too keenlyfeels that he has no further claims than these, and he therefore mostdiffidently asks for his work the indulgence of his readers. 

I would take this opportunity of expressing my gratitude to Dr. Klemm, Hofrath and Chief Librarian at Dresden, and to Mr. Von Weber, Ministerial-rath and Head of the Royal Archives of Saxony, for thecourtesy and kindness extended to me so uniformly during the course of myresearches in that city. I would also speak a word of sincere thanks toMr. Campbell, Assistant Librarian at the Hague, for his numerous acts offriendship during the absence of, his chief, M. Holtrop. To that mostdistinguished critic and historian, M. Bakhuyzen van den Brinck, ChiefArchivist of the Netherlands, I am under deep obligations for advice, instruction, and constant kindness, during my residence at the Hague; andI would also signify my sense of the courtesy of Mr. Charter-Master deSchwane, and of the accuracy with which copies of MSS. In the archiveswere prepared for me by his care. Finally, I would allude in thestrongest language of gratitude and respect to M. Gachard, Archivist-General of Belgium, for his unwearied courtesy and manifoldacts of kindness to me during my studies in the Royal Archives ofBrussels. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. 

Part 1. 

I. 

The north-western corner of the vast plain which extends from the Germanocean to the Ural mountains, is occupied by the countries called theNetherlands. This small triangle, enclosed between France, Germany, andthe sea, is divided by the modern kingdoms of Belgium and Holland intotwo nearly equal portions. Our earliest information concerning thisterritory is derived from the Romans. The wars waged by that nation withthe northern barbarians have rescued the damp island of Batavia, with itsneighboring morasses, from the obscurity in which they might haveremained for ages, before any thing concerning land or people would havebeen made known by the native inhabitants. Julius Caesar has saved from, oblivion the heroic savages who fought against his legions in defence oftheir dismal homes with ferocious but unfortunate patriotism; and thegreat poet of England, learning from the conqueror's Commentaries thename of the boldest tribe, has kept the Nervii, after almost twentycenturies, still fresh and familiar in our ears. 

Tacitus, too, has described with singular minuteness the struggle betweenthe people of these regions and the power of Rome, overwhelming, althoughtottering to its fall; and has moreover, devoted several chapters of hiswork upon Germany to a description of the most remarkable Teutonic tribesof the Netherlands. 

Geographically and ethnographically, the Low Countries belong both toGaul and to Germany. It is even doubtful to which of the two the Batavianisland, which is the core of the whole country, was reckoned by theRomans. It is, however, most probable that all the land, with theexception of Friesland, was considered a part of Gaul. 

Three great rivers--the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheld--had depositedtheir slime for ages among the dunes and sand banks heaved up by theocean around their mouths. A delta was thus formed, habitable at last forman. It was by nature a wide morass, in which oozy islands and savageforests were interspersed among lagoons and shallows; a district lyingpartly below the level of the ocean at its higher tides, subject toconstant overflow from the rivers, and to frequent and terribleinundations by the sea. 

The Rhine, leaving at last the regions where its storied lapse, throughso many ages, has been consecrated alike by nature and art-by poetry andeventful truth--flows reluctantly through the basalt portal of theSeven Mountains into the open fields which extend to the German sea. After entering this vast meadow, the stream divides itself into twobranches, becoming thus the two-horned Rhine of Virgil, and holds inthese two arms the island of Batavia. 

The Meuse, taking its rise in the Vosges, pours itself through theArdennes wood, pierces the rocky ridges upon the southeastern frontier ofthe Low Countries, receives the Sambre in the midst of that picturesqueanthracite basin where now stands the city of Namur, and then movestoward the north, through nearly the whole length of the country, till itmingles its waters with the Rhine. 

The Scheld, almost exclusively a Belgian river, after leaving itsfountains in Picardy, flows through the present provinces of Flanders andHainault. In Caesar's time it was suffocated before reaching the sea inquicksands and thickets, which long afforded protection to the savageinhabitants against the Roman arms; and which the slow process of natureand the untiring industry of man have since converted into thearchipelago of Zealand and South Holland. These islands were unknown tothe Romans. 

Such were the rivers, which, with their numerous tributaries, coursedthrough the spongy land. Their frequent overflow, when forced back upontheir currents by the stormy sea, rendered the country almostuninhabitable. Here, within a half-submerged territory, a race ofwretched ichthyophagi dwelt upon terpen, or mounds, which they hadraised, like beavers, above the almost fluid soil. Here, at a later day, the same race chained the tyrant Ocean and his mighty streams intosubserviency, forcing them to fertilize, to render commodious, to coverwith a beneficent network of veins and arteries, and to bind by wateryhighways with the furthest ends of the world, a country disinherited bynature of its rights. A region, outcast of ocean and earth, wrested atlast from both domains their richest treasures. A race, engaged forgenerations in stubborn conflict with the angry elements, wasunconsciously educating itself for its great struggle with the still moresavage despotism of man. 

The whole territory of the Netherlands was girt with forests. Anextensive belt of woodland skirted the sea-coast; reaching beyond themouths of the Rhine. Along the outer edge of this carrier, the dunes castup by the sea were prevented by the close tangle of thickets fromdrifting further inward; and thus formed a breastwork which time and artwere to strengthen. The groves of Haarlem and the Hague are relics ofthis ancient forest. The Badahuenna wood, horrid with Druidic sacrifices, extended along the eastern line of the vanished lake of Flevo. The vastHercynian forest, nine days' journey in breadth, closed in the country onthe German side, stretching from the banks of the Rhine to the remoteregions of the Dacians, in such vague immensity (says the conqueror ofthe whole country) that no German, after traveling sixty days, had everreached, or even heard of; its commencement. On the south, the famousgroves of Ardennes, haunted by faun and satyr, embowered the country, andseparated it from Celtic Gaul. 

Thus inundated by mighty rivers, quaking beneath the level of the ocean, belted about by hirsute forests, this low land, nether land, hollow land, or Holland, seemed hardly deserving the arms of the all-accomplishedRoman. Yet foreign tyranny, from the earliest ages, has coveted thismeagre territory as lustfully as it has sought to wrest from their nativepossessors those lands with the fatal gift of beauty for their dower;while the genius of liberty has inspired as noble a resistance tooppression here as it ever aroused in Grecian or Italian breasts. 

II. 

It can never be satisfactorily ascertained who were the aboriginalinhabitants. The record does not reach beyond Caesar's epoch, and hefound the territory on the left of the Rhine mainly tenanted by tribes ofthe Celtic family. That large division of the Indo-European group whichhad already overspread many portions of Asia Minor, Greece, Germany, theBritish Islands, France, and Spain, had been long settled in Belgic Gaul, and constituted the bulk of its population. Checked in its westwardmovement by the Atlantic, its current began to flow backwards towards itsfountains, so that the Gallic portion of the Netherland population wasderived from the original race in its earlier wanderings and from thelater and refluent tide coming out of Celtic Gaul. The modern appellationof the Walloons points to the affinity of their ancestors with theGallic, Welsh, and Gaelic family. The Belgae were in many respects asuperior race to most of their blood-allies. They were, according toCaesar's testimony, the bravest of all the Celts. This may be in partattributed to the presence of several German tribes, who, at this periodhad already forced their way across the Rhine, mingled their qualitieswith the Belgic material, and lent an additional mettle to the Celticblood. The heart of the country was thus inhabited by a Gallic race, butthe frontiers had been taken possession of by Teutonic tribes. 

When the Cimbri and their associates, about a century before our era, made their memorable onslaught upon Rome, the early inhabitants of theRhine island of Batavia, who were probably Celts, joined in theexpedition. A recent and tremendous inundation had swept away theirmiserable homes, and even the trees of the forests, and had thus renderedthem still more dissatisfied with their gloomy abodes. The island wasdeserted of its population. At about the same period a civil dissensionamong the Chatti--a powerful German race within the Hercynianforest--resulted in the expatriation of a portion of the people. Theexiles sought a new home in the empty Rhine island, called it "Bet-auw, "or "good-meadow, " and were themselves called, thenceforward, Batavi, orBatavians. 

These Batavians, according to Tacitus, were the bravest of all theGermans. The Chatti, of whom they formed a portion, were a pre-eminentlywarlike race. "Others go to battle, " says the historian, "these go towar. " Their bodies were more hardy, their minds more vigorous, than thoseof other tribes. Their young men cut neither hair nor beard till they hadslain an enemy. On the field of battle, in the midst of carnage andplunder, they, for the first time, bared their faces. The cowardly andsluggish, only, remained unshorn. They wore an iron ring, too, or shackleupon their necks until they had performed the same achievement, a symbolwhich they then threw away, as the emblem of sloth. The Batavians wereever spoken of by the Romans with entire respect. They conquered theBelgians, they forced the free Frisians to pay tribute, but they calledthe Batavians their friends. The tax-gatherer never invaded their island. Honorable alliance united them with the Romans. It was, however, thealliance of the giant and the dwarf. The Roman gained glory and empire, the Batavian gained nothing but the hardest blows. The Batavian cavalrybecame famous throughout the Republic and the Empire. They were thefavorite troops of Caesar, and with reason, for it was their valor whichturned the tide of battle at Pharsalia. From the death of Julius down tothe times of Vespasian, the Batavian legion was the imperial body guard, the Batavian island the basis of operations in the Roman wars with Gaul, Germany, and Britain. 

Beyond the Batavians, upon the north, dwelt the great Frisian family, occupying the regions between the Rhine and Ems, The Zuyder Zee and theDollart, both caused by the terrific inundations of the thirteenthcentury and not existing at this period, did not then interposeboundaries between kindred tribes. All formed a homogeneous nation ofpure German origin. 

Thus, the population of the country was partly Celtic, partly German. Ofthese two elements, dissimilar in their tendencies and always difficultto blend, the Netherland people has ever been compounded. A certainfatality of history has perpetually helped to separate still more widelythese constituents, instead of detecting and stimulating the electiveaffinities which existed. Religion, too, upon all great historicaloccasions, has acted as the most powerful of dissolvents. Otherwise, hadso many valuable and contrasted characteristics been early fused into awhole, it would be difficult to show a race more richly endowed by Naturefor dominion and progress than the Belgo-Germanic people. 

Physically the two races resembled each other. Both were of vast stature. The gigantic Gaul derided the Roman soldiers as a band of pigmies. TheGerman excited astonishment by his huge body and muscular limbs. Bothwere fair, with fierce blue eyes, but the Celt had yellow hair floatingover his shoulders, and the German long locks of fiery red, which he evendyed with woad to heighten the favorite color, and wore twisted into awar-knot upon the top of his head. Here the German's love of fineryceased. A simple tunic fastened at his throat with a thorn, while hisother garments defined and gave full play to his limbs, completed hiscostume. The Gaul, on the contrary, was so fond of dress that the Romansdivided his race respectively into long-haired, breeched, and gownedGaul; (Gallia comata, braccata, togata). He was fond of brilliant andparti-colored clothes, a taste which survives in the Highlander'scostume. He covered his neck and arms with golden chains. The simple andferocious German wore no decoration save his iron ring, from which hisfirst homicide relieved him. The Gaul was irascible, furious in hiswrath, but less formidable in a sustained conflict with a powerful foe. "All the Gauls are of very high stature, " says a soldier who fought underJulian. (Amm. Marcel. Xv. 12. 1). "They are white, golden-haired, terrible in the fierceness of their eyes, greedy of quarrels, braggingand insolent. A band of strangers could not resist one of them in abrawl, assisted by his strong blue-eyed wife, especially when she begins, gnashing her teeth, her neck swollen, brandishing her vast and snowyarms, and kicking with her heels at the same time, to deliver herfisticuffs, like bolts from the twisted strings of a catapult. The voicesof many are threatening and formidable. They are quick to anger, butquickly appeased. All are clean in their persons; nor among them is everseen any man or woman, as elsewhere, squalid in ragged garments. At allages they are apt for military service. The old man goes forth to thefight with equal strength of breast, with limbs as hardened by cold andassiduous labor, and as contemptuous of all dangers, as the young. Notone of them, as in Italy is often the case, was ever known to cut off histhumbs to avoid the service of Mars. "

The polity of each race differed widely from that of the other. Thegovernment of both may be said to have been republican, but the Gallictribes were aristocracies, in which the influence of clanship was apredominant feature; while the German system, although nominally regal, was in reality democratic. In Gaul were two orders, the nobility and thepriesthood, while the people, says Caesar, were all slaves. The knightsor nobles were all trained to arms. Each went forth to battle, followedby his dependents, while a chief of all the clans was appointed to takecommand during the war. The prince or chief governor was electedannually, but only by the nobles. The people had no rights at all, andwere glad to assign themselves as slaves to any noble who was strongenough to protect them. In peace the Druids exercised the main functionsof government. They decided all controversies, civil and criminal. Torebel against their decrees was punished by exclusion from thesacrifices--a most terrible excommunication, through which the criminalwas cut off from all intercourse with his fellow-creatures. 

With the Germans, the sovereignty resided in the great assembly of thepeople. There were slaves, indeed, but in small number, consisting eitherof prisoners of war or of those unfortunates who had gambled away theirliberty in games of chance. Their chieftains, although called by theRomans princes and kings, were, in reality, generals, chosen by universalsuffrage. Elected in the great assembly to preside in war, they wereraised on the shoulders of martial freemen, amid wild battle cries andthe clash of spear and shield. The army consisted entirely of volunteers, and the soldier was for life infamous who deserted the field while hischief remained alive. The same great assembly elected the villagemagistrates and decided upon all important matters both of peace and war. At the full of the moon it was usually convoked. The nobles and thepopular delegates arrived at irregular intervals, for it was aninconvenience arising from their liberty, that two or three days wereoften lost in waiting for the delinquents. All state affairs were in thehands of this fierce democracy. The elected chieftains had ratherauthority to persuade than power to command. 

The Gauls were an agricultural people. They were not without many arts oflife. They had extensive flocks and herds; and they even exported saltedprovisions as far as Rome. The truculent German, Ger-mane, Heer-mann, War-man, considered carnage the only useful occupation, and despisedagriculture as enervating and ignoble. It was base, in his opinion, togain by sweat what was more easily acquired by blood. The land wasdivided annually by the magistrates, certain farms being assigned tocertain families, who were forced to leave them at the expiration of theyear. They cultivated as a common property the lands allotted by themagistrates, but it was easier to summon them to the battle-field than tothe plough. Thus they were more fitted for the roaming and conqueringlife which Providence was to assign to them for ages, than if they hadbecome more prone to root themselves in the soil. The Gauls built townsand villages. The German built his solitary hut where inclinationprompted. Close neighborhood was not to his taste. 

In their system of religion the two races were most widely contrasted. The Gauls were a priest-ridden race. Their Druids were a dominant caste, presiding even over civil affairs, while in religious matters theirauthority was despotic. What were the principles of their wild Theologywill never be thoroughly ascertained, but we know too much of itssanguinary rites. The imagination shudders to penetrate those shaggyforests, ringing with the death-shrieks of ten thousand human victims, and with the hideous hymns chanted by smoke-and-blood-stained priests tothe savage gods whom they served. 

The German, in his simplicity, had raised himself to a purer belief thanthat of the sensuous Roman or the superstitious Gaul. He believed in asingle, supreme, almighty God, All-Vater or All-father. This Divinity wastoo sublime to be incarnated or imaged, too infinite to be enclosed intemples built with hands. Such is the Roman's testimony to the loftyconception of the German. Certain forests were consecrated to the unseenGod whom the eye of reverent faith could alone behold. Thither, at statedtimes, the people repaired to worship. They entered the sacred grove withfeet bound together, in token of submission. Those who fell wereforbidden to rise, but dragged themselves backwards on the ground. Theirrules were few and simple. They had no caste of priests, nor were they, when first known to the Romans, accustomed to offer sacrifice. It must beconfessed that in a later age, a single victim, a criminal or a prisoner, was occasionally immolated. The purity of their religion was soon stainedby their Celtic neighborhood. In the course of the Roman dominion itbecame contaminated, and at last profoundly depraved. The fantasticintermixture of Roman mythology with the gloomy but modified superstitionof Romanized Celts was not favorable to the simple character of Germantheology. The entire extirpation, thus brought about, of any conceivablesystem of religion, prepared the way for a true revelation. Within thatlittle river territory, amid those obscure morasses of the Rhine andScheld, three great forms of religion--the sanguinary superstition of theDruid, the sensuous polytheism of the Roman, the elevated but dimlygroping creed of the German, stood for centuries, face to face, until, having mutually debased and destroyed each other, they all faded away inthe pure light of Christianity. 

Thus contrasted were Gaul and German in religious and political systems. The difference was no less remarkable in their social characteristics. The Gaul was singularly unchaste. The marriage state was almost unknown. Many tribes lived in most revolting and incestuous concubinage; brethren, parents, and children, having wives in common. The German was loyal asthe Celt was dissolute. Alone among barbarians, he contented himself witha single wife, save that a few dignitaries, from motives of policy, werepermitted a larger number. On the marriage day the German offeredpresents to his bride--not the bracelets and golden necklaces with whichthe Gaul adorned his fair-haired concubine, but oxen and a bridled horse, a sword, a shield, and a spear-symbols that thenceforward she was toshare his labors and to become a portion of himself. 

They differed, too, in the honors paid to the dead. The funerals of theGauls were pompous. Both burned the corpse, but the Celt cast into theflames the favorite animals, and even the most cherished slaves anddependents of the master. Vast monuments of stone or piles of earth wereraised above the ashes of the dead. Scattered relics of the Celtic ageare yet visible throughout Europe, in these huge but unsightly memorials. 

The German was not ambitious at the grave. He threw neither garments norodors upon the funeral pyre, but the arms and the war-horse of thedeparted were burned and buried with him. 

The turf was his only sepulchre, the memory of his valor his onlymonument. Even tears were forbidden to the men. "It was esteemedhonorable, " says the historian, "for women to lament, for men toremember. "

The parallel need be pursued no further. Thus much it was necessary torecall to the historical student concerning the prominent characteristicsby which the two great races of the land were distinguished:characteristics which Time has rather hardened than effaced. In thecontrast and the separation lies the key to much of their history. HadProvidence permitted a fusion of the two races, it is, possible, fromtheir position, and from the geographical and historical link which theywould have afforded to the dominant tribes of Europe, that a world-empiremight have been the result, different in many respects from any which hasever arisen. Speculations upon what might have been are idle. It is well, however; to ponder the many misfortunes resulting from a mutualrepulsion, which, under other circumstances and in other spheres, hasbeen exchanged for mutual attraction and support. 

It is now necessary to sketch rapidly the political transformationsundergone by the country, from the early period down to the middle of thesixteenth century; the epoch when the long agony commenced, out of whichthe Batavian republic was born. 

III. 

The earliest chapter in the history of the Netherlands was written bytheir conqueror. Celtic Gaul is already in the power of Rome; the Belgictribes, alarmed at the approaching danger, arm against the universal, tyrant. Inflammable, quick to strike, but too fickle to prevail againstso powerful a foe, they hastily form a league of almost every clan. Atthe first blow of Caesar's sword, the frail confederacy falls asunderlike a rope of sand. The tribes scatter in all directions. 

Nearly all are soon defeated, and sue for mercy. The Nervii, true to theGerman blood in their veins, swear to die rather than surrender. They, at least, are worthy of their cause. Caesar advances against them at thehead of eight legions. Drawn up on the banks of the Sambre, they awaitthe Roman's approach. In three days' march Caesar comes up with them, pitches his camp upon a steep hill sloping down to the river, and sendssome cavalry across. Hardly have the Roman horsemen crossed the stream, than the Nervii rush from the wooded hill-top, overthrow horse and rider, plunge in one great mass into the current, and, directly afterwards, areseen charging up the hill into the midst of the enemy's force. "At thesame moment, " says the conqueror, "they seemed in the wood, in the river, and within our lines. " There is a panic among the Romans, but it isbrief. Eight veteran Roman legions, with the world's victor at theirhead, are too much for the brave but undisciplined Nervii. Snatching ashield from a soldier, and otherwise unarmed, Caesar throws himself intothe hottest of the fight. The battle rages foot to foot and hand to handbut the hero's skill, with the cool valor of his troops, provesinvincible as ever. The Nervii, true to their vow, die, but not a mansurrenders. They fought upon that day till the ground was heaped withtheir dead, while, as the foremost fell thick and fast, their comrades, says the Roman, sprang upon their piled-up bodies, and hurled theirjavelins at the enemy as from a hill. They fought like men to whom lifewithout liberty was a curse. They were not defeated, but exterminated. Ofmany thousand fighting men went home but five hundred. Upon reaching theplace of refuge where they had bestowed their women and children, Caesarfound, after the battle, that there were but three of their senators leftalive. So perished the Nervii. Caesar commanded his legions to treat withrespect the little remnant of the tribe which had just fallen to swellthe empty echo of his glory, and then, with hardly a breathing pause, heproceeded to annihilate the Aduatici, the Menapii, and the Morini. 

Gaul being thus pacified, as, with sublime irony, he expresses himselfconcerning a country some of whose tribes had been annihilated, some soldas slaves, and others hunted to their lairs like beasts of prey, theconqueror departed for Italy. Legations for peace from many German racesto Rome were the consequence of these great achievements. Among othersthe Batavians formed an alliance with the masters of the world. Theirposition was always an honorable one. They were justly proud of paying notribute, but it was, perhaps, because they had nothing to pay. They hadfew cattle, they could give no hides and horns like the Frisians, andthey were therefore allowed to furnish only their blood. From this timeforth their cavalry, which was the best of Germany, became renowned inthe Roman army upon every battle-field of Europe. 

It is melancholy, at a later moment, to find the brave Bataviansdistinguished in the memorable expedition of Germanicus to crush theliberties of their German kindred. They are forever associated with thesublime but misty image of the great Hermann, the hero, educated in Rome, and aware of the colossal power of the empire, who yet, by his genius, valor, and political adroitness, preserved for Germany her nationality, her purer religion, and perhaps even that noble language which herlate-flowering literature has rendered so illustrious--but they areassociated as enemies, not as friends. 

Galba, succeeding to the purple upon the suicide of Nero, dismissed theBatavian life-guards to whom he owed his elevation. He is murdered, Othoand Vitellius contend for the succession, while all eyes are turned uponthe eight Batavian regiments. In their hands the scales of empire seem torest. They declare for Vitellius, and the civil war begins. Otho isdefeated; Vitellius acknowledged by Senate and people. Fearing, like hispredecessors, the imperious turbulence of the Batavian legions, he, too, sends them into Germany. It was the signal for a long and extensiverevolt, which had well nigh overturned the Roman power in Gaul and LowerGermany. 

IV. 

Claudius Civilis was a Batavian of noble race, who had served twenty-fiveyears in the Roman armies. His Teutonic name has perished, for, like mostsavages who become denizens of a civilized state, he had assumed anappellation in the tongue of his superiors. He was a soldier of fortune, and had fought wherever the Roman eagles flew. After a quarter of acentury's service he was sent in chains to Rome, and his brotherexecuted, both falsely charged with conspiracy. Such were the triumphsadjudged to Batavian auxiliaries. He escaped with life, and was disposedto consecrate what remained of it to a nobler cause. Civilis was nobarbarian. Like the German hero Arminius, he had received a Romaneducation, and had learned the degraded condition of Rome. He knew theinfamous vices of her rulers; he retained an unconquerable love forliberty and for his own race. Desire to avenge his own wrongs was mingledwith loftier motives in his breast. He knew that the sceptre was in thegift of the Batavian soldiery. Galba had been murdered, Otho haddestroyed himself, and Vitellius, whose weekly gluttony cost the empiremore gold than would have fed the whole Batavian population and convertedtheir whole island-morass into fertile pastures, was contending for thepurple with Vespasian, once an obscure adventurer like Civilis himself, and even his friend and companion in arms. It seemed a time to strike ablow for freedom. 

By his courage, eloquence, and talent for political combinations, Civiliseffected a general confederation of all the Netherland tribes, bothCeltic and German. For a brief moment there was a united people, aBatavian commonwealth. He found another source of strength in Germansuperstition. On the banks of the Lippe, near its confluence with theRhine, dwelt the Virgin Velleda, a Bructerian weird woman, who exercisedvast influence over the warriors of her nation. Dwelling alone in a loftytower, shrouded in a wild forest, she was revered as an oracle. Heranswers to the demands of her worshippers concerning future events weredelivered only to a chosen few. To Civilis, who had formed a closefriendship with her, she promised success, and the downfall of the Romanworld. Inspired by her prophecies, many tribes of Germany sent largesubsidies to the Batavian chief. 

The details of the revolt have been carefully preserved by Tacitus, andform one of his grandest and most elaborate pictures. The spectacle of abrave nation, inspired by the soul of one great man and rising against anoverwhelming despotism, will always speak to the heart, from generationto generation. The battles, the sieges, the defeats, the indomitablespirit of Civilis, still flaming most brightly when the clouds weredarkest around him, have been described by the great historian in hismost powerful manner. The high-born Roman has thought the noblebarbarian's portrait a subject worthy his genius. 

The struggle was an unsuccessful one. After many victories and manyoverthrows, Civilis was left alone. The Gallic tribes fell off, and suedfor peace. Vespasian, victorious over Vitellius, proved too powerful forhis old comrade. Even the Batavians became weary of the hopeless contest, while fortune, after much capricious hovering, settled at last upon theRoman side. The imperial commander Cerialis seized the moment when thecause of the Batavian hero was most desperate to send emissaries amonghis tribe, and even to tamper with the mysterious woman whose prophecieshad so inflamed his imagination. These intrigues had their effect. Thefidelity of the people was sapped; the prophetess fell away from herworshipper, and foretold ruin to his cause. The Batavians murmured thattheir destruction was inevitable, that one nation could not arrest theslavery which was destined for the whole world. How large a part of thehuman race were the Batavians? What were they in a contest with the wholeRoman empire? Moreover, they were not oppressed with tribute. They wereonly expected to furnish men and valor to their proud allies. It was thenext thing to liberty. If they were to have rulers, it was better toserve a Roman emperor than a German witch. 

Thus murmured the people. Had Civilis been successful, he would have beendeified; but his misfortunes, at last, made him odious in spite of hisheroism. But the Batavian was not a man to be crushed, nor had he livedso long in the Roman service to be outmatched in politics by thebarbarous Germans. He was not to be sacrificed as a peace-offering torevengeful Rome. Watching from beyond the Rhine the progress of defectionand the decay of national enthusiasm, he determined to be beforehand withthose who were now his enemies. He accepted the offer of negotiation fromCerialis. The Roman general was eager to grant a full pardon, and tore-enlist so brave a soldier in the service of the empire. 

A colloquy was agreed upon. The bridge across the Nabalia was brokenasunder in the middle, and Cerialis and Civilis met upon the severedsides. The placid stream by which Roman enterprise had connected thewaters of the Rhine with the lake of Flevo, flowed between the imperialcommander and the rebel chieftain. 

 ***********************************************

Here the story abruptly terminates. The remainder of the Roman'snarrative is lost, and upon that broken bridge the form of the Batavianhero disappears forever. His name fades from history: not a syllable isknown of his subsequent career; every thing is buried in the profoundoblivion which now steals over the scene where he was the most imposingactor. 

The soul of Civilis had proved insufficient to animate a whole people;yet it was rather owing to position than to any personal inferiority, that his name did not become as illustrious as that of Hermann. TheGerman patriot was neither braver nor wiser than the Batavian, but he hadthe infinite forests of his fatherland to protect him. Every legion whichplunged into those unfathomable depths was forced to retreatdisastrously, or to perish miserably. Civilis was hemmed in by the ocean;his country, long the basis of Roman military operations, was accessibleby river and canal, The patriotic spirit which he had for a momentraised, had abandoned him; his allies had deserted him; he stood aloneand at bay, encompassed by the hunters, with death or surrender as hisonly alternative. Under such circumstances, Hermann could not have shownmore courage or conduct, nor have terminated the impossible struggle withgreater dignity or adroitness. 

The contest of Civilis with Rome contains a remarkable foreshadowing ofthe future conflict with Spain, through which the Batavian republic, fifteen centuries later, was to be founded. The characters, the events, the amphibious battles, desperate sieges, slippery alliances, the traitsof generosity, audacity and cruelty, the generous confidence, the brokenfaith seem so closely to repeat themselves, that History appears topresent the self-same drama played over and over again, with but a changeof actors and of costume. There is more than a fanciful resemblancebetween Civilis and William the Silent, two heroes of ancient Germanstock, who had learned the arts of war and peace in the service of aforeign and haughty world-empire. Determination, concentration ofpurpose, constancy in calamity, elasticity almost preternatural, self-denial, consummate craft in political combinations, personalfortitude, and passionate patriotism, were the heroic elements in both. The ambition of each was subordinate to the cause which he served. Bothrefused the crown, although each, perhaps, contemplated, in the sequel, aBatavian realm of which he would have been the inevitable chief. Bothoffered the throne to a Gallic prince, for Classicus was but theprototype of Anjou, as Brinno of Brederode, and neither was destined, inthis world, to see his sacrifices crowned with success. 

The characteristics of the two great races of the land portrayedthemselves in the Roman and the Spanish struggle with much the samecolors. The Southrons, inflammable, petulant, audacious, were the firstto assault and to defy the imperial power in both revolts, while theinhabitants of the northern provinces, slower to be aroused, but of moreenduring wrath, were less ardent at the commencement, but; alone, steadfast at the close of the contest. In both wars the southern Celtsfell away from the league, their courageous but corrupt chieftains havingbeen purchased with imperial gold to bring about the abject submission oftheir followers; while the German Netherlands, although eventuallysubjugated by Rome, after a desperate struggle, were successful in thegreat conflict with Spain, and trampled out of existence every vestige ofher authority. The Batavian republic took its rank among the leadingpowers of the earth; the Belgic provinces remained Roman, Spanish, Austrian property. 

V. 

Obscure but important movements in the regions of eternal twilight, revolutions, of which history has been silent, in the mysterious depthsof Asia, outpourings of human rivets along the sides of the Altaimountains, convulsions up-heaving r mote realms and unknown dynasties, shock after shock throb bing throughout the barbarian world and dyingupon the edge of civilization, vast throes which shake the earth asprecursory pangs to the birth of a new empire--as dying symptoms of theproud but effete realm which called itself the world; scattered hordes ofsanguinary, grotesque savages pushed from their own homes, and hoveringwith vague purposes upon the Roman frontier, constantly repelled andperpetually reappearing in ever-increasing swarms, guided thither by afierce instinct, or by mysterious laws--such are the well known phenomenawhich preceded the fall of western Rome. Stately, externally powerful, although undermined and putrescent at the core, the death-stricken empirestill dashed back the assaults of its barbarous enemies. 

During the long struggle intervening between the age of Vespasian andthat of Odoacer, during all the preliminary ethnographical revolutionswhich preceded the great people's wandering, the Netherlands remainedsubject provinces. Their country was upon the high road which led theGoths to Rome. Those low and barren tracts were the outlying marches ofthe empire. Upon that desolate beach broke the first surf from the risingocean of German freedom which was soon to overwhelm Rome. Yet, althoughthe ancient landmarks were soon well nigh obliterated, the Netherlandsstill remained faithful to the Empire, Batavian blood was still pouredout for its defence. 

By the middle of the fourth century, the Franks and Allemanians, alle-mannez, all-men, a mass of united Germans are defeated by theEmperor Julian at Strasburg, the Batavian cavalry, as upon many othergreat occasions, saving the day for despotism. This achievement, one ofthe last in which the name appears upon historic record, was therefore astriumphant for the valor as it was humiliating to the true fame of thenation. Their individuality soon afterwards disappears, the race havingbeen partly exhausted in the Roman service, partly merged in the Frankand Frisian tribes who occupy the domains of their forefathers. 

For a century longer, Rome still retains its outward form, but theswarming nations are now in full career. The Netherlands are successivelyor simultaneously trampled by Franks, Vandals, Alani, Suevi, Saxons, Frisians, and even Sclavonians, as the great march of Germany touniversal empire, which her prophets and bards had foretold, wentmajestically forward. The fountains of the frozen North were opened, thewaters prevailed, but the ark of Christianity floated upon the flood. Asthe deluge assuaged, the earth had returned to chaos, the last paganempire had been washed out of existence, but the dimly, groping, faltering, ignorant infancy of Christian Europe had begun. 

After the wanderings had subsided, the Netherlands are found with muchthe same ethnological character as before. The Frank dominion hassucceeded the Roman, the German stock preponderates over the Celtic, butthe national ingredients, although in somewhat altered proportions, remain essentially the same. The old Belgae, having become Romanized intongue and customs, accept the new Empire of the Franks. That people, however, pushed from their hold of the Rhine by thickly thronging hordesof Gepidi, Quadi, Sarmati, Heruli, Saxons, Burgundians, move towards theSouth and West. As the Empire falls before Odoacer, they occupy CelticGaul with the Belgian portion of the Netherlands; while the Frisians, into which ancient German tribe the old Batavian element has melted, notto be extinguished, but to live a renovated existence, the "freeFrisians;" whose name is synonymous with liberty, nearest blood relationsof the Anglo-Saxon race, now occupy the northern portion, including thewhole future European territory of the Dutch republic. 

The history of the Franks becomes, therefore, the history of theNetherlands. The Frisians struggle, for several centuries, against theirdominion, until eventually subjugated by Charlemagne. They even encroachupon the Franks in Belgic Gaul, who are determined not to yield theirpossessions. Moreover, the pious Merovingian faineans desire to plantChristianity among the still pagan Frisians. Dagobert, son of the secondClotaire, advances against them as far as the Weser, takes possession ofUtrecht, founds there the first Christian church in Friesland, andestablishes a nominal dominion over the whole country. 

Yet the feeble Merovingians would have been powerless against ruggedFriesland, had not their dynasty already merged in that puissant familyof Brabant, which long wielded their power before it assumed their crown. It was Pepin of Heristal, grandson of the Netherlander, Pepin of Landen, who conquered the Frisian Radbod (A. D. 692), and forced him to exchangehis royal for the ducal title. 

It was Pepin's bastard, Charles the Hammer, whose tremendous blowscompleted his father's work. The new mayor of the palace soon drove theFrisian chief into submission, and even into Christianity. A bishop'sindiscretion, however, neutralized the apostolic blows of the mayor. Thepagan Radbod had already immersed one of his royal legs in the baptismalfont, when a thought struck him. "Where are my dead forefathers atpresent?" he said, turning suddenly upon Bishop Wolfran. "In Hell, withall other unbelievers, " was the imprudent answer. "Mighty well, " repliedRadbod, removing his leg, "then will I rather feast with my ancestors inthe halls of Woden, than dwell with your little starveling hand ofChristians in Heaven. " Entreaties and threats were unavailing. TheFrisian declined positively a rite which was to cause an eternalseparation from his buried kindred, and he died as he had lived, aheathen. His son, Poppa, succeeding to the nominal sovereignty, did notactively oppose the introduction of Christianity among his people, buthimself refused to be converted. Rebelling against the Frank dominion, hewas totally routed by Charles Martell in a great battle (A. D. 750) andperished with a vast number of Frisians. The Christian dispensation, thusenforced, was now accepted by these northern pagans. The commencement oftheir conversion had been mainly the work of their brethren from Britain. The monk Wilfred was followed in a few years by the Anglo-SaxonWillibrod. It was he who destroyed the images of Woden in Walcheren, abolished his worship, and founded churches in North Holland. CharlesMartell rewarded him with extensive domains about Utrecht, together withmany slaves and other chattels. Soon afterwards he was consecrated Bishopof all the Frisians. Thus rose the famous episcopate of Utrecht. AnotherAnglo-Saxon, Winfred, or Bonifacius, had been equally active among hisFrisian cousins. His crozier had gone hand in hand with the battle-axe. Bonifacius followed close upon the track of his orthodox coadjutorCharles. By the middle of the eighth century, some hundred thousandFrisians had been slaughtered, and as many more converted. The hammerwhich smote the Saracens at Tours was at last successful in beating theNetherlanders into Christianity. The labors of Bonifacius through Upperand Lower Germany were immense; but he, too, received great materialrewards. He was created Archbishop of Mayence, and, upon the death ofWillibrod, Bishop of Utrecht. Faithful to his mission, however, he met, heroically, a martyr's death at the hands of the refractory pagans atDokkum. Thus was Christianity established in the Netherlands. 

Under Charlemagne, the Frisians often rebelled, making common cause withthe Saxons. In 785, A. D. , they were, however, completely subjugated, andnever rose again until the epoch of their entire separation from theFrank empire. Charlemagne left them their name of free Frisians, and theproperty in their own land. The feudal system never took root in theirsoil. "The Frisians, " says their statute book; "shall be free, as long asthe wind blows out of the clouds and the world stands. " They agreed, however, to obey the chiefs whom the Frank monarch should appoint togovern them, according to their own laws. Those laws were collected, andare still extant. The vernacular version of their Asega book containstheir ancient customs, together with the Frank additions. The generalstatutes of Charlemagne were, of course, in vigor also; but that greatlegislator knew too well the importance attached by all mankind to localcustoms, to allow his imperial capitulara to interfere, unnecessarily, with the Frisian laws. 

VI. 

Thus again the Netherlands, for the first time since the fall of Rome, were united under one crown imperial. They had already been once united, in their slavery to Rome. Eight centuries pass away, and they are againunited, in subjection to Charlemagne. Their union was but in forming asingle link in the chain of a new realm. The reign of Charlemagne had atlast accomplished the promise of the sorceress Velleda and othersoothsayers. A German race had re-established the empire of the world. The Netherlands, like-the other provinces of the great monarch'sdominion, were governed by crown-appointed functionaries, military andjudicial. In the northeastern, or Frisian portion, however; the grants ofland were never in the form of revocable benefices or feuds. With thisimportant exception, the whole country shared the fate, and enjoyed thegeneral organization of the Empire. 

But Charlemagne came an age too soon. The chaos which had brooded overEurope since the dissolution of the Roman world, was still too absolute. It was not to be fashioned into permanent forms, even by his bold andconstructive genius. A soil, exhausted by the long culture of Paganempires, was to lie fallow for a still longer period. The discordantelements out of which the Emperor had compounded his realm, did notcoalesce during his life-time. They were only held together by thevigorous grasp of the hand which had combined them. When the greatstatesman died, his Empire necessarily fell to pieces. Society had needof farther disintegration before it could begin to reconstruct itselflocally. A new civilization was not to be improvised by a single mind. When did one man ever civilize a people? In the eighth and ninthcenturies there was not even a people to be civilized. The constructionof Charles was, of necessity, temporary. His Empire was supported byartificial columns, resting upon the earth, which fell prostrate almostas soon as the hand of their architect was cold. His institutions had notstruck down into the soil. There were no extensive and vigorous roots tonourish, from below, a flourishing Empire through time and tempest. 

Moreover, the Carlovingian race had been exhausted by producing a race ofheroes like the Pepins and the Charleses. The family became, soon, ascontemptible as the ox-drawn, long-haired "do-nothings" whom it hadexpelled; but it is not our task to describe the fortunes of theEmperor's ignoble descendants. The realm was divided, sub-divided, attimes partially reunited, like a family farm, among monarchs incompetentalike to hold, to delegate, or--to resign the inheritance of the greatwarrior and lawgiver. The meek, bald, fat, stammering, simple Charles, orLouis, who successively sat upon his throne--princes, whose only historicindividuality consists in these insipid appellations--had not the senseto comprehend, far less to develop, the plans of their ancestor. 

Charles the Simple was the last Carlovingian who governed Lotharingia, inwhich were comprised most of the Netherlands and Friesland. The Germanmonarch, Henry the Fowler, at that period called King of the East Franks, as Charles of the West Franks, acquired Lotharingia by the treaty ofBonn, Charles reserving the sovereignty over the kingdom during hislifetime. In 925, A. D. , however, the Simpleton having been imprisoned anddeposed by his own subjects, the Fowler was recognized King, ofLotharingia. Thus the Netherlands passed out of France into Germany, remaining, still, provinces of a loose, disjointed Empire. 

This is the epoch in which the various dukedoms, earldoms, and otherpetty sovereignties of the Netherlands became hereditary. It was in theyear 922 that Charles the Simple presented to Count Dirk the territory ofHolland, by letters patent. This narrow hook of land, destined, in futureages, to be the cradle of a considerable empire, stretching through bothhemispheres, was, thenceforth, the inheritance of Dirk's descendants. Historically, therefore, he is Dirk I. , Count of Holland. 

Of this small sovereign and his successors, the most powerful foe forcenturies was ever the Bishop of Utrecht, the origin of whose greatnesshas been already indicated. Of the other Netherland provinces, now orbefore become hereditary, the first in rank was Lotharingia, once thekingdom of Lothaire, now the dukedom of Lorraine. In 965 it was dividedinto Upper and Lower Lorraine, of which the lower duchy alone belonged tothe Netherlands. Two centuries later, the Counts of Louvain, thenoccupying most of Brabant, obtained a permanent hold of Lower Lorraine, and began to call themselves Dukes of Brabant. The same principle oflocal independence and isolation which created these dukes, establishedthe hereditary power of the counts and barons who formerly exercisedjurisdiction under them and others. Thus arose sovereign Counts of Namur, Hainault, Limburg, Zutphen, Dukes of Luxemburg and Gueldres, Barons ofMechlin, Marquesses of Antwerp, and others; all petty autocrats. The mostimportant of all, after the house of Lorraine, were the Earls ofFlanders; for the bold foresters of Charles the Great had soon wrestedthe sovereignty of their little territory from his feeble descendants aseasily as Baldwin, with the iron arm, had deprived the bald Charles ofhis daughter. Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Overyssel, Groningen, Drentheand Friesland (all seven being portions of Friesland in a general sense), were crowded together upon a little desolate corner of Europe; an obscurefragment of Charlemagne's broken empire. They were afterwards toconstitute the United States of the Netherlands, one of the most powerfulrepublics of history. Meantime, for century after century, the Counts ofHolland and the Bishops of Utrecht were to exercise divided sway over theterritory. 

Thus the whole country was broken into many shreds and patches ofsovereignty. The separate history of such half-organized morsels istedious and petty. Trifling dynasties, where a family or two were everything, the people nothing, leave little worth recording. Even the mostdevout of genealogists might shudder to chronicle the long succession ofso many illustrious obscure. 

A glance, however, at the general features of the governmental system nowestablished in the Netherlands, at this important epoch in the world'shistory, will show the transformations which the country, in common withother portions of the western world, had undergone. 

In the tenth century the old Batavian and later Roman forms have fadedaway. An entirely new polity has succeeded. No great popular assemblyasserts its sovereignty, as in the ancient German epoch; no generals andtemporary kings are chosen by the nation. The elective power had beenlost under the Romans, who, after conquest, had conferred theadministrative authority over their subject provinces upon officialsappointed by the metropolis. The Franks pursued the same course. InCharlemagne's time, the revolution is complete. Popular assemblies andpopular election entirely vanish. Military, civil, and judicialofficers-dukes, earls, margraves, and others--are all king's creatures, 'knegton des konings, pueri regis', and so remain, till they abjure thecreative power, and set up their own. The principle of Charlemagne, thathis officers should govern according to local custom, helps them toachieve their own independence, while it preserves all that is left ofnational liberty and law. 

The counts, assisted by inferior judges, hold diets from time totime--thrice, perhaps, annually. They also summon assemblies in case ofwar. Thither are called the great vassals, who, in turn, call theirlesser vassals; each armed with "a shield, a spear, a bow, twelve arrows, and a cuirass. " Such assemblies, convoked in the name of a distantsovereign, whose face his subjects had never seen, whose language theycould hardly understand, were very different from those tumultuousmass-meetings, where boisterous freemen, armed with the weapons theyloved the best, and arriving sooner or later, according to theirpleasure, had been accustomed to elect their generals and magistrates andto raise them upon their shields. The people are now governed, theirrulers appointed by an invisible hand. Edicts, issued by a power, as itwere, supernatural, demand implicit obedience. The people, acquiescing intheir own annihilation, abdicate not only their political but theirpersonal rights. On the other hand, the great source of power diffusesless and less of light and warmth. Losing its attractive and controllinginfluence, it becomes gradually eclipsed, while its satellites fly fromtheir prescribed bounds and chaos and darkness return. The sceptre, stretched over realms so wide, requires stronger hands than those ofdegenerate Carlovingians. It breaks asunder. Functionaries becomesovereigns, with hereditary, not delegated, right to own the people, totax their roads and rivers, to take tithings of their blood and sweat, toharass them in all the relations of life. There is no longer a metropolisto protect them from official oppression. Power, the more sub-divided, becomes the more tyrannical. The sword is the only symbol of law, thecross is a weapon of offence, the bishop is a consecrated pirate, everypetty baron a burglar, while the people, alternately the prey of duke, prelate, and seignor, shorn and butchered like sheep, esteem it happinessto sell themselves into slavery, or to huddle beneath the castle walls ofsome little potentate, for the sake of his wolfish protection. Here theybuild hovels, which they surround from time to time with palisades andmuddy entrenchments; and here, in these squalid abodes of ignorance andmisery, the genius of Liberty, conducted by the spirit of Commerce, descends at last to awaken mankind from its sloth and cowardly stupor. Alonger night was to intervene; however, before the dawn of day. 

The crown-appointed functionaries had been, of course, financialofficers. They collected the revenue of the sovereign, one third of whichslipped through their fingers into their own coffers. Becoming sovereignsthemselves, they retain these funds for their private emolument. Fourprincipal sources yielded this revenue: royal domains, tolls and imposts, direct levies and a pleasantry called voluntary contributions orbenevolences. In addition to these supplies were also the proceeds offines. Taxation upon sin was, in those rude ages, a considerable branchof the revenue. The old Frisian laws consisted almost entirely of adiscriminating tariff upon crimes. Nearly all the misdeeds which man isprone to commit, were punished by a money-bote only. Murder, larceny, arson, rape--all offences against the person were commuted for a definiteprice. There were a few exceptions, such as parricide, which was followedby loss of inheritance; sacrilege and the murder of a master by a slave, which were punished with death. It is a natural inference that, as theroyal treasury was enriched by these imposts, the sovereign would hardlyattempt to check the annual harvest of iniquity by which his revenue wasincreased. Still, although the moral sense is shocked by a system whichmakes the ruler's interest identical with the wickedness of his people, and holds out a comparative immunity in evil-doing for the rich, it wasbetter that crime should be punished by money rather than not be punishedat all. A severe tax, which the noble reluctantly paid and which thepenniless culprit commuted by personal slavery, was sufficiently unjustas well as absurd, yet it served to mitigate the horrors with whichtumult, rapine, and murder enveloped those early days. Gradually, as thelight of reason broke upon the dark ages, the most noxious features ofthe system were removed, while the general sentiment of reverence for lawremained. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 A country disinherited by nature of its rights A pleasantry called voluntary contributions or benevolences Annual harvest of iniquity by which his revenue was increased Batavian legion was the imperial body guard Beating the Netherlanders into Christianity Bishop is a consecrated pirate Brethren, parents, and children, having wives in common For women to lament, for men to remember Gaul derided the Roman soldiers as a band of pigmies Great science of political equilibrium Holland, England, and America, are all links of one chain Long succession of so many illustrious obscure Others go to battle, says the historian, these go to war Revocable benefices or feuds Taxation upon sin The Gaul was singularly unchaste

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 2. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLICJOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 1855

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. , Part 2. 

VII. 

Five centuries of isolation succeed. In the Netherlands, as throughoutEurope, a thousand obscure and slender rills are slowly preparing thegreat stream of universal culture. Five dismal centuries of feudalism:during which period there is little talk of human right, little obedienceto divine reason. Rights there are none, only forces; and, in brief, three great forces, gradually arising, developing themselves, acting uponeach other, and upon the general movement of society. 

The sword--the first, for a time the only force: the force of iron. The"land's master, " having acquired the property in the territory and in thepeople who feed thereon, distributes to his subalterns, often but a shadebeneath him in power, portions of his estate, getting the use of theirfaithful swords in return. Vavasours subdivide again to vassals, exchanging land and cattle, human or otherwise, against fealty, and sothe iron chain of a military hierarchy, forged of mutually interdependentlinks, is stretched over each little province. Impregnable castles, heremore numerous than in any other part of Christendom, dot the levelsurface of the country. Mail-clad knights, with their followers, encamppermanently upon the soil. The fortunate fable of divine right isinvented to sanction the system; superstition and ignorance give currencyto the delusion. Thus the grace of God, having conferred the property ina vast portion of Europe upon a certain idiot in France, makes himcompetent to sell large fragments of his estate, and to give a divine, and, therefore, most satisfactory title along with them. A greatconvenience to a man, who had neither power, wit, nor will to keep theproperty in his own hands. So the Dirks of Holland get a deed fromCharles the Simple, and, although the grace of God does not prevent theroyal grantor himself from dying a miserable, discrowned captive, theconveyance to Dirk is none the less hallowed by almighty fiat. So theRoberts and Guys, the Johns and Baldwins, become sovereigns in Hainault, Brabant, Flanders and other little districts, affecting supernaturalsanction for the authority which their good swords have won and are everready to maintain. Thus organized, the force of iron asserts and exertsitself. Duke, count, seignor and vassal, knight and squire, master andman swarm and struggle amain. A wild, chaotic, sanguinary scene. Here, bishop and baron contend, centuries long, murdering human creatures byten thousands for an acre or two of swampy pasture; there, doughtyfamilies, hugging old musty quarrels to their heart, buffet each otherfrom generation to generation; thus they go on, raging and wrestlingamong themselves, with all the world, shrieking insane war-cries which nohuman soul ever understood--red caps and black, white hoods and grey, Hooks and Kabbeljaws, dealing destruction, building castles and burningthem, tilting at tourneys, stealing bullocks, roasting Jews, robbing thehighways, crusading--now upon Syrian sands against Paynim dogs, now inFrisian quagmires against Albigenses, Stedingers, and otherheretics--plunging about in blood and fire, repenting, at idle times, andpaying their passage through, purgatory with large slices of ill-gottengains placed in the ever-extended dead-hand of the Church; acting, on thewhole, according to their kind, and so getting themselves civilized orexterminated, it matters little which. Thus they play their part, thoseenergetic men-at-arms; and thus one great force, the force of iron, spinsand expands itself, century after century, helping on, as it whirls, thegreat progress of society towards its goal, wherever that may be. 

Another force--the force clerical--the power of clerks, arises; the mightof educated mind measuring itself against brute violence; a forceembodied, as often before, as priestcraft--the strength of priests: craftmeaning, simply, strength, in our old mother-tongue. This great force, too, develops itself variously, being sometimes beneficent, sometimesmalignant. Priesthood works out its task, age after age: now smoothingpenitent death-beds, consecrating graves! feeding the hungry, clothingthe naked, incarnating the Christian precepts, in an age of rapine andhomicide, doing a thousand deeds of love and charity among the obscureand forsaken--deeds of which there shall never be human chronicle, but aleaf or two, perhaps, in the recording angel's book; hiving precioushoney from the few flowers of gentle, art which bloom upon a howlingwilderness; holding up the light of science over a stormy sea; treasuringin convents and crypts the few fossils of antique learning which becomevisible, as the extinct Megatherium of an elder world reappears after thegothic deluge; and now, careering in helm and hauberk with the otherruffians, bandying blows in the thickest of the fight, blasting withbell, book, and candle its trembling enemies, while sovereigns, at thehead of armies, grovel in the dust and offer abject submission for thekiss of peace; exercising the same conjury over ignorant baron andcowardly hind, making the fiction of apostolic authority to bind andloose, as prolific in acres as the other divine right to have and hold;thus the force of cultivated intellect, wielded by a chosen few andsanctioned by supernatural authority, becomes as potent as the sword. 

A third force, developing itself more slowly, becomes even more potentthan the rest: the power of gold. Even iron yields to the more ductilemetal. The importance of municipalities, enriched by trade, begins to befelt. Commerce, the mother of Netherland freedom, and, eventually, itsdestroyer--even as in all human history the vivifying becomes afterwardsthe dissolving principle--commerce changes insensibly and miraculouslythe aspect of society. Clusters of hovels become towered cities; thegreen and gilded Hanse of commercial republicanism coils itself aroundthe decaying trunk of feudal despotism. Cities leagued with citiesthroughout and beyond Christendom-empire within empire-bind themselvescloser and closer in the electric chain of human sympathy and growstronger and stronger by mutual support. Fishermen and river raftsmenbecome ocean adventurers and merchant princes. Commerce plucks uphalf-drowned Holland by the locks and pours gold into her lap. Goldwrests power from iron. Needy Flemish weavers become mightymanufacturers. Armies of workmen, fifty thousand strong, tramp throughthe swarming streets. Silk-makers, clothiers, brewers become the gossipsof kings, lend their royal gossips vast sums and burn the royal notes ofhand in fires of cinnamon wood. Wealth brings strength, strengthconfidence. Learning to handle cross-bow and dagger, the burghers fearless the baronial sword, finding that their own will cut as well, seeingthat great armies--flowers of chivalry--can ride away before them fastenough at battles of spurs and other encounters. Sudden riches begetinsolence, tumults, civic broils. Internecine quarrels, horrible tumultsstain the streets with blood, but education lifts the citizens more andmore out of the original slough. They learn to tremble as little atpriestcraft as at swordcraft, having acquired something of each. Gold inthe end, unsanctioned by right divine, weighs up the other forces, supernatural as they are. And so, struggling along their appointed path, making cloth, making money, making treaties with great kingdoms, makingwar by land and sea, ringing great bells, waving great banners, they, too--these insolent, boisterous burghers--accomplish their work. Thus, the mighty power of the purse develops itself and municipal libertybecomes a substantial fact. A fact, not a principle; for the old theoremof sovereignty remains undisputed as ever. Neither the nation, in mass, nor the citizens, in class, lay claim to human rights. All upperattributes--legislative, judicial, administrative--remain in theland-master's breast alone. It is an absurdity, therefore, to argue withGrotius concerning the unknown antiquity of the Batavian republic. Therepublic never existed at all till the sixteenth century, and was onlyborn after long years of agony. The democratic instincts of the ancientGerman savages were to survive in the breasts of their cultivateddescendants, but an organized, civilized, republican polity had neverexisted. The cities, as they grew in strength, never claimed the right tomake the laws or to share in the government. As a matter of fact, theydid make the laws, and shared, beside, in most important functions ofsovereignty, in the treaty-making power, especially. Sometimes bybargains; sometimes by blood, by gold, threats, promises, or good hardblows they extorted their charters. Their codes, statutes, joyfulentrances, and other constitutions were dictated by the burghers andsworn to by the monarch. They were concessions from above; privilegesprivate laws; fragments indeed of a larger liberty, but vastly, betterthan the slavery for which they had been substituted; solid facts insteadof empty abstractions, which, in those practical and violent days, wouldhave yielded little nutriment; but they still rather sought to reconcilethemselves, by a rough, clumsy fiction, with the hierarchy which they hadinvaded, than to overturn the system. Thus the cities, not regardingthemselves as representatives or aggregations of the people, becamefabulous personages, bodies without souls, corporations which hadacquired vitality and strength enough to assert their existence. Aspersons, therefore--gigantic individualities--they wheeled into thefeudal ranks and assumed feudal powers and responsibilities. The city ofDort; of Middelburg, of Ghent, of Louvain, was a living being, doingfealty, claiming service, bowing to its lord, struggling with its equals, trampling upon its slaves. 

Thus, in these obscure provinces, as throughout Europe, in a thousandremote and isolated corners, civilization builds itself up, syntheticallyand slowly; yet at last, a whole is likely to get itself constructed. Thus, impelled by great and conflicting forces, now obliquely, nowbackward, now upward, yet, upon the whole, onward, the new Society movesalong its predestined orbit, gathering consistency and strength as itgoes. Society, civilization, perhaps, but hardly humanity. The people hashardly begun to extricate itself from the clods in which it lies buried. There are only nobles, priests, and, latterly, cities. In the northernNetherlands, the degraded condition of the mass continued longest. Evenin Friesland, liberty, the dearest blessing of the ancient Frisians, hadbeen forfeited in a variety of ways. Slavery was both voluntary andcompulsory. Paupers sold themselves that they might escape starvation. The timid sold themselves that they might escape violence. Thesevoluntary sales, which were frequent, wore usually made to cloisters andecclesiastical establishments, for the condition of Church-slaves waspreferable to that of other serfs. Persons worsted in judicial duels, shipwrecked sailors, vagrants, strangers, criminals unable to pay themoney-bote imposed upon them, were all deprived of freedom; but theprolific source of slavery was war. Prisoners were almost universallyreduced to servitude. A free woman who intermarried with a slavecondemned herself and offspring to perpetual bondage. Among the RipuarianFranks, a free woman thus disgracing herself, was girt with a sword and adistaff. Choosing the one, she was to strike her husband dead; choosingthe other, she adopted the symbol of slavery, and became a chattel forlife. 

The ferocious inroads of the Normans scared many weak and timid personsinto servitude. They fled, by throngs, to church and monastery, and werehappy, by enslaving themselves, to escape the more terrible bondage ofthe sea-kings. During the brief dominion of the Norman Godfrey, everyfree Frisian was forced to wear a halter around his neck. The lot of aChurch-slave was freedom in comparison. To kill him was punishable by aheavy fine. He could give testimony in court, could inherit, could make awill, could even plead before the law, if law could be found. The numberof slaves throughout the Netherlands was very large; the number belongingto the bishopric of Utrecht, enormous. 

The condition of those belonging to laymen was much more painful. TheLyf-eigene, or absolute slaves, were the most wretched. They were merebrutes. They had none of the natural attributes of humanity, their lifeand death were in the master's hands, they had no claim to a fraction oftheir own labor or its fruits, they had no marriage, except undercondition of the infamous 'jus primoe noctis'. The villagers, orvilleins, were the second class and less forlorn. They could commute thelabor due to their owner by a fixed sum of money, after annual payment ofwhich, the villein worked for himself. His master, therefore, was not hisabsolute proprietor. The chattel had a beneficial interest in a portionof his own flesh and blood. 

The crusades made great improvement in the condition of the serfs. He whobecame a soldier of the cross was free upon his return, and many wereadventurous enough to purchase liberty at so honorable a price. Manyothers were sold or mortgaged by the crusading knights, desirous ofconverting their property into gold, before embarking upon theirenterprise. The purchasers or mortgagees were in general churches andconvents, so that the slaves, thus alienated, obtained at least apreferable servitude. The place of the absent serfs was supplied by freelabor, so that agricultural and mechanical occupations, now devolvingupon a more elevated class, became less degrading, and, in process oftime, opened an ever-widening sphere for the industry and progress offreemen. Thus a people began to exist. It was, however; a miserablepeople, with personal, but no civil rights whatever. Their condition, although better than servitude, was almost desperate. They were taxedbeyond their ability, while priest and noble were exempt. They had novoice in the apportionment of the money thus contributed. There was noredress against the lawless violence to which they were perpetuallyexposed. In the manorial courts, the criminal sat in judgment upon hisvictim. The functions of highwayman and magistrate were combined in oneindividual. 

By degrees, the class of freemen, artisans, traders, and the like, becoming the more numerous, built stronger and better houses outside thecastle gates of the "land's master" or the burghs of the more powerfulnobles. The superiors, anxious to increase their own importance, favoredthe progress of the little boroughs. The population, thus collected, began to divide themselves into guilds. These were soon afterwardserected by the community into bodies corporate; the establishment of thecommunity, of course, preceding, the incorporation of the guilds. Thosecommunities were created by charters or Keuren, granted by the sovereign. Unless the earliest concessions of this nature have perished, the towncharters of Holland or Zeland are nearly a century later than those ofFlanders, France, and England. 

The oldest Keur, or act of municipal incorporation, in the provincesafterwards constituting the republic, was that granted by Count Williamthe First of Holland and Countess Joanna of Flanders, as jointproprietors of Walcheren, to the town of Middelburg. It will be seen thatits main purport is to promise, as a special privilege to this community, law, in place of the arbitrary violence by which mankind, in general, were governed by their betters. 

"The inhabitants, " ran the Charter, "are taken into protection by bothcounts. Upon fighting, maiming, wounding, striking, scolding; uponpeace-breaking, upon resistance to peace-makers and to the judgment ofSchepens; upon contemning the Ban, upon selling spoiled wine, and uponother misdeeds fines are imposed for behoof of the Count, the city, andsometimes of the Schepens. . . . . . . To all Middelburgers one kind of law isguaranteed. Every man must go to law before the Schepens. If any onebeing summoned and present in Walcheren does not appear, or refusessubmission to sentence, he shall be banished with confiscation ofproperty. Schout or Schepen denying justice to a complainant, shall, until reparation, hold no tribunal again. . . . . . . A burgher having a disputewith an outsider (buiten mann) must summon him before the Schepens. Anappeal lies from the Schepens to the Count. No one can testify but ahouseholder. All alienation of real estate must take place before theSchepens. If an outsider has a complaint against a burgher, the Schepensand Schout must arrange it. If either party refuses submission to them, they must ring the town bell and summon an assembly of all the burghersto compel him. Any one ringing the town bell, except by general consent, and any one not appearing when it tolls, are liable to a fine. NoMiddelburger can be arrested or held in durance within Flanders orHolland, except for crime. "

This document was signed, sealed, and sworn to by the two sovereigns inthe year 1217. It was the model upon which many other communities, cradles of great cities, in Holland and Zeland, were afterwards created. 

These charters are certainly not very extensive, even for the privilegedmunicipalities which obtained them, when viewed from an abstractstand-point. They constituted, however, a very great advance from thestand-point at which humanity actually found itself. They created, notfor all inhabitants, but for great numbers of them, the right, not togovern them selves but to be governed by law: They furnished a localadministration of justice. They provided against arbitrary imprisonment. They set up tribunals, where men of burgher class were to sit injudgment. They held up a shield against arbitrary violence from above andsedition from within. They encouraged peace-makers, punishedpeace-breakers. They guarded the fundamental principle, 'ut suatanerent', to the verge of absurdity; forbidding a freeman, without afreehold, from testifying--a capacity not denied even to a country slave. Certainly all this was better than fist-law and courts manorial. For thecommencement of the thirteenth century, it was progress. 

The Schout and Schepens, or chief magistrate and aldermen, wereoriginally appointed by the sovereign. In process of time, the electionof these municipal authorities was conceded to the communities. Thisinestimable privilege, however, after having been exercised during acertain period by the whole body of citizens, was eventually monopolizedby the municipal government itself, acting in common with the deans ofthe various guilds. 

Thus organized and inspired with the breath of civic life, thecommunities of Flanders and Holland began to move rapidly forward. Moreand more they assumed the appearance of prosperous little republics. Forthis prosperity they were indebted to commerce, particularly with Englandand the Baltic nations, and to manufactures, especially of wool. 

The trade between England and the Netherlands had existed for ages, andwas still extending itself, to the great advantage of both countries. Adispute, however, between the merchants of Holland and England, towardsthe year 1215, caused a privateering warfare, and a ten years' suspensionof intercourse. A reconciliation afterwards led to the establishment ofthe English wool staple, at Dort. A subsequent quarrel deprived Hollandof this great advantage. King Edward refused to assist Count Florence ina war with the Flemings, and transferred the staple from Dort to Brugesand Mechlin. 

The trade of the Netherlands with the Mediterranean and the East wasmainly through this favored city of Bruges, which, already in thethirteenth century, had risen to the first rank in the commercial world. It was the resting-place for the Lombards and other Italians, the greatentrepot for their merchandise. It now became, in addition, the greatmarketplace for English wool, and the woollen fabrics of all theNetherlands, as well as for the drugs and spices of the East. It had, however, by no means reached its apogee, but was to culminate withVenice, and to sink with her decline. When the overland Indian trade felloff with the discovery of the Cape passage, both cities withered. Grassgrew in the fair and pleasant streets of Bruges, and sea-weed clusteredabout the marble halls of Venice. At this epoch, however, both were in astate of rapid and insolent prosperity. 

The cities, thus advancing in wealth and importance, were no longersatisfied with being governed according to law, and began to participate, not only in their own, but in the general government. Under Guy ofFlanders, the towns appeared regularly, as well as the nobles, in theassembly of the provincial estates. (1386-1389, A. D. ) In the course ofthe following century, the six chief cities, or capitals, of Holland(Dort, Harlem, Delft, Leyden, Goads, and Amsterdam) acquired the right ofsending their deputies regularly to the estates of the provinces. Thesetowns, therefore, with the nobles, constituted the parliamentary power ofthe nation. They also acquired letters patent from the count, allowingthem to choose their burgomasters and a limited number of councillors orsenators (Vroedschappen). 

Thus the liberties of Holland and Flanders waxed, daily, stronger. Agreat physical convulsion in the course of the thirteenth century came toadd its influence to the slower process of political revolution. Hithertothere had been but one Friesland, including Holland, and nearly all theterritory of the future republic. A slender stream alone separated thetwo great districts. The low lands along the Vlie, often threatened, atlast sank in the waves. The German Ocean rolled in upon the inland Lakeof Flevo. The stormy Zuyder Zee began its existence by engulfingthousands of Frisian villages, with all their population, and byspreading a chasm between kindred peoples. The political, as well as thegeographical, continuity of the land was obliterated by this tremendousdeluge. The Hollanders were cut off from their relatives in the east byas dangerous a sea as that which divided them from their Anglo-Saxonbrethren in Britain. The deputies to the general assemblies at Aurichcould no longer undertake a journey grown so perilous. West Frieslandbecame absorbed in Holland. East Friesland remained a federation of rudebut self-governed maritime provinces, until the brief and bloody dominionof the Saxon dukes led to the establishment of Charles the Fifth'sauthority. Whatever the nominal sovereignty over them, this mostrepublican tribe of Netherlanders, or of Europeans, had never acceptedfeudalism. There was an annual congress of the whole confederacy. Each ofthe seven little states, on the other hand, regulated its own internalaffairs. Each state was subdivided into districts, each district governedby a Griet-mann (greatman, selectman) and assistants. Above all thesedistrict officers was a Podesta, a magistrate identical, in name andfunctions, with the chief officer of the Italian republics. There wassometimes but one Podesta; sometimes one for each province. He was chosenby the people, took oath of fidelity to the separate estates, or, ifPodesta-general, to the federal diet, and was generally elected for alimited term, although sometimes for life. He was assisted by a board ofeighteen or twenty councillors. The deputies to the general congress werechosen by popular suffrage in Easter-week. The clergy were not recognizedas a political estate. 

Thus, in those lands which a niggard nature had apparently condemned toperpetual poverty and obscurity, the principle of reasonable humanfreedom, without which there is no national prosperity or glory worthcontending for, was taking deepest and strongest root. Already in thethirteenth and fourteenth centuries Friesland was a republic, except inname; Holland, Flanders, Brabant, had acquired a large share ofself-government. The powerful commonwealth, at a later period to beevolved out of the great combat between centralized tyranny and thespirit of civil and religious liberty, was already foreshadowed. Theelements, of which that important republic was to be compounded, weregerminating for centuries. Love of freedom, readiness to strike and bleedat any moment in her cause, manly resistance to despotism, howeverovershadowing, were the leading characteristics of the race in allregions or periods, whether among Frisian swamps, Dutch dykes, the gentlehills and dales of England, or the pathless forests of America. Doubtless, the history of human liberty in Holland and Flanders, as everywhere else upon earth where there has been such a history, unrolls manyscenes of turbulence and bloodshed; although these features have beenexaggerated by prejudiced historians. Still, if there were luxury andinsolence, sedition and uproar, at any rate there was life. Those violentlittle commonwealths had blood in their veins. They were compact ofproud, self-helping, muscular vigor. The most sanguinary tumults whichthey ever enacted in the face of day, were better than the order andsilence born of the midnight darkness of despotism. That very unrulinesswas educating the people for their future work. Those merchants, manufacturers, country squires, and hard-fighting barons, all pent up ina narrow corner of the earth, quarrelling with each other and with allthe world for centuries, were keeping alive a national pugnacity ofcharacter, for which there was to be a heavy demand in the sixteenthcentury, and without which the fatherland had perhaps succumbed in themost unequal conflict ever waged by man against oppression. 

To sketch the special history of even the leading Netherland provinces, during the five centuries which we have thus rapidly sought tocharacterize, is foreign to our purpose. By holding the clue of Holland'shistory, the general maze of dynastic transformations throughout thecountry may, however, be swiftly threaded. From the time of the firstDirk to the close of the thirteenth century there were nearly fourhundred years of unbroken male descent, a long line of Dirks andFlorences. This iron-handed, hot-headed, adventurous race, placed assovereign upon its little sandy hook, making ferocious exertions to swellinto larger consequence, conquering a mile or two of morass or barrenfurze, after harder blows and bloodier encounters than might haveestablished an empire under more favorable circumstances, at last diesout. The courtship falls to the house of Avennes, Counts of Hainault. Holland, together with Zeland, which it had annexed, is thus joined tothe province of Hainault. At the end of another half century the Hainaultline expires. William the Fourth died childless in 1355. His death is thesignal for the outbreak of an almost interminable series of civilcommotions. Those two great, parties, known by the uncouth names of Hookand Kabbeljaw, come into existence, dividing noble against noble, cityagainst city, father against son, for some hundred and fifty years, without foundation upon any abstract or intelligible principle. It may beobserved, however, that, in the sequel, and as a general rule, theKabbeljaw, or cod-fish party, represented the city or municipal faction, while the Hooks (fish-hooks), that were to catch and control them, werethe nobles; iron and audacity against brute number and weight. 

Duke William of Bavaria, sister's son--of William the Fourth, getshimself established in 1354. He is succeeded by his brother Albert;Albert by his son William. William, who had married Margaret of Burgundy, daughter of Philip the Bold, dies in 1417. The goodly heritage of thesethree Netherland provinces descends to his daughter Jacqueline, a damselof seventeen. Little need to trace the career of the fair and ill-starredJacqueline. Few chapters of historical romance have drawn more frequenttears. The favorite heroine of ballad and drama, to Netherlanders she isendued with the palpable form and perpetual existence of the Iphigenias, Mary Stuarts, Joans of Arc, or other consecrated individualities. Exhausted and broken-hearted, after thirteen years of conflict with herown kinsmen, consoled for the cowardice and brutality of three husbandsby the gentle and knightly spirit of the fourth, dispossessed of herfather's broad domains, degraded from the rank of sovereign to be ladyforester of her own provinces by her cousin, the bad Duke of Burgundy, Philip surnamed "the Good, " she dies at last, and the good cousin takesundisputed dominion of the land. (1437. )

The five centuries of isolation are at end. The many obscure streams ofNetherland history are merged in one broad current. Burgundy has absorbedall the provinces which, once more, are forced to recognize a singlemaster. A century and a few years more succeed, during which this houseand its heirs are undisputed sovereigns of the soil. 

Philip the Good had already acquired the principal Netherlands, beforedispossessing Jacqueline. He had inherited, beside the two Burgundies, the counties of Flanders and Artois. He had purchased the county ofNamur, and had usurped the duchy of Brabant, to which the duchy ofLimburg, the marquisate of Antwerp, and the barony of Mechlin, hadalready been annexed. By his assumption of Jacqueline's dominions, he wasnow lord of Holland, Zeland, and Hainault, and titular master ofFriesland. He acquired Luxemburg a few years later. 

Lord of so many opulent cities and fruitful provinces, he felt himselfequal to the kings of Europe. Upon his marriage with Isabella ofPortugal, he founded, at Bruges, the celebrated order of the GoldenFleece. What could be more practical or more devout than the conception?Did not the Lamb of God, suspended at each knightly breast, symbolize atonce the woollen fabrics to which so much of Flemish wealth andBurgundian power was owing, and the gentle humility of Christ, which wasever to characterize the order? Twenty-five was the limited number, including Philip himself, as grand master. The chevaliers were emperors, kings, princes, and the most illustrious nobles of Christendom; while aleading provision, at the outset, forbade the brethren, crowned headsexcepted, to accept or retain the companionship of any other order. 

The accession of so potent and ambitious a prince as the good Philipboded evil to the cause of freedom in the Netherlands. The spirit ofliberty seemed to have been typified in the fair form of the benignantand unhappy Jacqueline, and to be buried in her grave. The usurper, whohad crushed her out of existence, now strode forward to trample upon allthe laws and privileges of the provinces which had formed her heritage. 

At his advent, the municipal power had already reached an advanced stageof development. The burgher class controlled the government, not only ofthe cities, but often of the provinces, through its influence in theestates. Industry and wealth had produced their natural results. Thesupreme authority of the sovereign and the power of the nobles werebalanced by the municipal principle which had even begun to preponderateover both. All three exercised a constant and salutary check upon eachother. Commerce had converted slaves into freemen, freemen into burghers, and the burghers were acquiring daily, a larger practical hold upon thegovernment. The town councils were becoming almost omnipotent. Althoughwith an oligarchical tendency, which at a later period was to be morefully developed, they were now composed of large numbers of individuals, who had raised themselves, by industry and intelligence, out of thepopular masses. There was an unquestionably republican tone to theinstitutions. Power, actually, if not nominally, was in the hands of manywho had achieved the greatness to which they had not been born. 

The assemblies of the estates were rather diplomatic than representative. They consisted, generally, of the nobles and of the deputations from thecities. In Holland, the clergy had neither influence nor seats in theparliamentary body. Measures were proposed by the stadholder, whorepresented the sovereign. A request, for example, of pecuniary, accommodation, was made by that functionary or by the count himself inperson. The nobles then voted upon the demand, generally as one body, butsometimes by heads. The measure was then laid before the burghers. Ifthey had been specially commissioned to act upon the matter; they voted, each city as a city, not each deputy, individually. If they had receivedno instructions, they took back the proposition to lay before thecouncils of their respective cities, in order to return a decision at anadjourned session, or at a subsequent diet. It will be seen, therefore, that the principle of national, popular representation was butimperfectly developed. The municipal deputies acted only underinstructions. Each city was a little independent state, suspicious notonly of the sovereign and nobles, but of its sister cities. This mutualjealousy hastened the general humiliation now impending. The centre ofthe system waging daily more powerful, it more easily unsphered thesefeebler and mutually repulsive bodies. 

Philip's first step, upon assuming the government, was to issue adeclaration, through the council of Holland, that the privileges andconstitutions, which he had sworn to as Ruward, or guardian, during theperiod in which Jacqueline had still retained a nominal sovereignty, wereto be considered null and void, unless afterwards confirmed by him ascount. At a single blow he thus severed the whole knot of pledges, oathsand other political complications, by which he had entangled himselfduring his cautious advance to power. He was now untrammelled again. Asthe conscience of the smooth usurper was, thenceforth, the measure ofprovincial liberty, his subjects soon found it meted to them moresparingly than they wished. From this point, then, through the Burgundianperiod, and until the rise of the republic, the liberty of theNetherlands, notwithstanding several brilliant but brief laminations, occurring at irregular intervals, seemed to remain in almost perpetualeclipse. 

The material prosperity of the country had, however, vastly increased. The fisheries of Holland had become of enormous importance. The inventionof the humble Beukelzoon of Biervliet, had expanded into a mine ofwealth. The fisheries, too, were most useful as a nursery of seamen, andwere already indicating Holland's future naval supremacy. The fishermenwere the militia of the ocean, their prowess attested in the war with theHanseatic cities, which the provinces of Holland and Zeland, in Philip'sname, but by their own unassisted exertions, carried on triumphantly atthis epoch. Then came into existence that race of cool and daringmariners, who, in after times, were to make the Dutch name illustriousthroughout the world, the men, whose fierce descendants, the "beggars ofthe sea, " were to make the Spanish empire tremble, the men, whose latersuccessors swept the seas with brooms at the mast-head, and whoseocean-battles with their equally fearless English brethren often lastedfour uninterrupted days and nights. 

The main strength of Holland was derived from the ocean, from whosedestructive grasp she had wrested herself, but in whose friendly embraceshe remained. She was already placing securely the foundations ofcommercial wealth and civil liberty upon those shifting quicksands whichthe Roman doubted whether to call land or water. Her submerged deformity, as she floated, mermaid-like, upon the waves was to be forgotten in hermaterial splendor. Enriched with the spoils of every clime, crowned withthe divine jewels of science and art, she was, one day, to sing a sirensong of freedom, luxury, and power. 

As with Holland, so with Flanders, Brabant, and the other leadingprovinces. Industry and wealth, agriculture, commerce, and manufactures, were constantly augmenting. The natural sources of power were full tooverflowing, while the hand of despotism was deliberately sealing thefountain. 

For the house of Burgundy was rapidly culminating and as rapidlycurtailing the political privileges of the Netherlands. The contest was, at first, favorable to the cause of arbitrary power; but little seedswere silently germinating, which, in the progress of their giganticdevelopment, were, one day, to undermine the foundations of Tyranny andto overshadow the world. The early progress of the religious reformationin the Netherlands will be outlined in a separate chapter. Another greatprinciple was likewise at work at this period. At the very epoch when thegreatness of Burgundy was most swiftly ripening, another weapon wassecretly forging, more potent in the great struggle for freedom than anywhich the wit or hand of man has ever devised or wielded. When Philip theGood, in the full blaze of his power, and flushed with the triumphs ofterritorial aggrandizement, was instituting at Bruges the order of theGolden Fleece, "to the glory of God, of the blessed Virgin, and of theholy Andrew, patron saint of the Burgundian family, " and enrolling thenames of the kings and princes who were to be honored with its symbols, at that very moment, an obscure citizen of Harlem, one Lorenz Coster, orLawrence the Sexton, succeeded in printing a little grammar, by means ofmovable types. The invention of printing was accomplished, but it was notushered in with such a blaze of glory as heralded the contemporaneouserection of the Golden Fleece. The humble setter of types did not deememperors and princes alone worthy his companionship. His invention sentno thrill of admiration throughout Christendom; and yet, what was thegood Philip of Burgundy, with his Knights of the Golden Fleece, and alltheir effulgent trumpery, in the eye of humanity and civilization, compared with the poor sexton and his wooden types?

 [The question of the time and place to which the invention of printing should be referred, has been often discussed. It is not probable that it will ever be settled to the entire satisfaction of Holland and Germany. The Dutch claim that movable types were first used at Harlem, fixing the time variously between the years 1423 and 1440. The first and very faulty editions of Lorenz are religiously preserved at Harlem. ]

Philip died in February, 1467. The details of his life and career do notbelong to our purpose. The practical tendency of his government was torepress the spirit of liberty, while especial privileges, extensive innature, but limited in time, were frequently granted to corporations. Philip, in one day, conferred thirty charters upon as many differentbodies of citizens. These were, however, grants of monopoly notconcessions of rights. He also fixed the number of city councils orVroedschappen in many Netherland cities, giving them permission topresent a double list of candidates for burgomasters and judges, fromwhich he himself made the appointments. He was certainly neither a goodnor great prince, but he possessed much administrative ability. Hismilitary talents were considerable, and he was successful in his wars. Hewas an adroit dissembler, a practical politician. He had the sense tocomprehend that the power of a prince, however absolute, must depend uponthe prosperity of his subjects. He taxed severely the wealth, but heprotected the commerce and the manufactures of Holland and Flanders. Heencouraged art, science, and literature. The brothers, John and HubertVan Eyck, were attracted by his generosity to Bruges, where they paintedmany pictures. John was even a member of the duke's council. The art ofoil-painting was carried to great perfection by Hubert's scholar, John ofBruges. An incredible number of painters, of greater or less merit, flourished at this epoch in the Netherlands, heralds of that greatschool, which, at a subsequent period, was to astonish the world withbrilliant colors; profound science, startling effects, and vigorousreproductions of Nature. Authors, too, like Olivier de la Marche andPhilippe de Comines, who, in the words of the latter, "wrote, not for theamusement of brutes, and people of low degree, but for princes and otherpersons of quality, " these and other writers, with aims as lofty, flourished at the court of Burgundy, and were rewarded by the Duke withprincely generosity. Philip remodelled and befriended the university ofLouvain. He founded at Brussels the Burgundian library, which becamecelebrated throughout Europe. He levied largely, spent profusely, but wasyet so thrifty a housekeeper, as to leave four hundred thousand crowns ofgold, a vast amount in those days, besides three million marks' worth ofplate and furniture, to be wasted like water in the insane career of hisson. 

The exploits of that son require but few words of illustration. Hardly achapter of European history or romance is more familiar to the world thanthe one which records the meteoric course of Charles the Bold. Thepropriety of his title was never doubtful. No prince was ever bolder, butit is certain that no quality could be less desirable, at that particularmoment in the history of his house. It was not the quality to confirm ausurping family in its ill-gotten possessions. Renewed aggressions uponthe rights of others justified retaliation and invited attack. Justice, prudence, firmness, wisdom of internal administration were desirable inthe son of Philip and the rival of Louis. These attributes the gladiatorlacked entirely. His career might have been a brilliant one in the olddays of chivalry. His image might have appeared as imposing as theromantic forms of Baldwin Bras de Fer or Godfrey of Bouillon, had he notbeen misplaced in history. Nevertheless, he imagined himself governed bya profound policy. He had one dominant idea, to make Burgundy a kingdom. From the moment when, with almost the first standing army known tohistory, and with coffers well filled by his cautious father's economy, he threw himself into the lists against the crafty Louis, down to the daywhen he was found dead, naked, deserted, and with his face frozen into apool of blood and water, he faithfully pursued this thought. His ducalcap was to be exchanged for a kingly crown, while all the provinces whichlay beneath the Mediterranean and the North Sea, and between France andGermany, were to be united under his sceptre. The Netherlands, with theirwealth, had been already appropriated, and their freedom crushed. Anotherland of liberty remained; physically, the reverse of Holland, but stampedwith the same courageous nationality, the same ardent love of humanrights. Switzerland was to be conquered. Her eternal battlements of iceand granite were to constitute the great bulwark of his realm. The worldknows well the result of the struggle between the lord of so many duchiesand earldoms, and the Alpine mountaineers. With all his boldness, Charleswas but an indifferent soldier. His only merit was physical courage. Heimagined himself a consummate commander, and, in conversation with hisjester, was fond of comparing himself to Hannibal. "We are getting wellHannibalized to-day, my lord, " said the bitter fool, as they rode offtogether from the disastrous defeat of Gransen. Well "Hannibalized" hewas, too, at Gransen, at Murten, and at Nancy. He followed in the trackof his prototype only to the base of the mountains. 

As a conqueror, he was signally unsuccessful; as a politician, he couldout-wit none but himself; it was only as a tyrant within his own ground, that he could sustain the character which he chose to enact. He lost thecrown, which he might have secured, because he thought the emperor's sonunworthy the heiress of Burgundy; and yet, after his father's death, hermarriage with that very Maximilian alone secured the possession of herpaternal inheritance. Unsuccessful in schemes of conquest, and inpolitical intrigue, as an oppressor of the Netherlands, he nearly carriedout his plans. Those provinces he regarded merely as a bank to draw upon. His immediate intercourse with the country was confined to the extortionof vast requests. These were granted with ever-increasing reluctance, bythe estates. The new taxes and excises, which the sanguinary extravaganceof the duke rendered necessary, could seldom be collected in the variouscities without tumults, sedition, and bloodshed. Few princes were ever agreater curse to the people whom they were allowed to hold as property. He nearly succeeded in establishing a centralized despotism upon theruins of the provincial institutions. His sudden death alone deferred thecatastrophe. His removal of the supreme court of Holland from the Hagueto Mechlin, and his maintenance of a standing army, were the two greatmeasures by which he prostrated the Netherlands. The tribunal had beenremodelled by his father; the expanded authority which Philip had givento a bench of judges dependent upon himself, was an infraction of therights of Holland. The court, however, still held its sessions in thecountry; and the sacred privilege--de non evocando--the right of everyHollander to be tried in his own land, was, at least, retained. Charlesthrew off the mask; he proclaimed that this council--composed of hiscreatures, holding office at his pleasure--should have supremejurisdiction over all the charters of the provinces; that it was tofollow his person, and derive all authority from his will. The usual seatof the court he transferred to Mechlin. It will be seen, in the sequel, that the attempt, under Philip the Second, to enforce its supremeauthority was a collateral cause of the great revolution of theNetherlands. 

Charles, like his father, administered the country by stadholders. Fromthe condition of flourishing self-ruled little republics, which they had, for a moment, almost attained, they became departments of anill-assorted, ill-conditioned, ill-governed realm, which was neithercommonwealth nor empire, neither kingdom nor duchy; and which had nohomogeneousness of population, no affection between ruler and people, small sympathies of lineage or of language. 

His triumphs were but few, his fall ignominious. His father's treasurewas squandered, the curse of a standing army fixed upon his people, thetrade and manufactures of the country paralyzed by his extortions, and heaccomplished nothing. He lost his life in the forty-fourth year of hisage (1477), leaving all the provinces, duchies, and lordships, whichformed the miscellaneous realm of Burgundy, to his only child, the LadyMary. Thus already the countries which Philip had wrested from the feeblehand of Jacqueline, had fallen to another female. Philip's owngranddaughter, as young, fair, and unprotected as Jacqueline, was nowsole mistress of those broad domains. 

VIII. 

A crisis, both for Burgundy and the Netherlands, succeeds. Within theprovinces there is an elastic rebound, as soon as the pressure is removedfrom them by the tyrant's death. A sudden spasm of liberty gives thewhole people gigantic strength. In an instant they recover all, and morethan all, the rights which they had lost. The cities of Holland, Flanders, and other provinces call a convention at Ghent. Laying asidetheir musty feuds, men of all parties-Hooks and Kabbeljaws, patriciansand people, move forward in phalanx to recover their nationalconstitutions. On the other hand, Louis the Eleventh seizes Burgundy, claiming the territory for his crown, the heiress for his son. Thesituation is critical for the Lady Mary. As usual in such cases, appealsare made to the faithful commons. A prodigality of oaths and pledges isshowered upon the people, that their loyalty may be refreshed and growgreen. The congress meets at Ghent. The Lady Mary professes much, but shewill keep her vow. The deputies are called upon to rally the countryaround the duchess, and to resist the fraud and force of Louis. Thecongress is willing to maintain the cause of its young mistress. Themembers declare, at the same time, very roundly, "that the provinces havebeen much impoverished and oppressed by the enormous taxation imposedupon them by the ruinous wars waged by Duke Charles from the beginning tothe end of his life. " They rather require "to be relieved thanadditionally encumbered. " They add that, "for many years past, there hasbeen a constant violation of the provincial and municipal charters, andthat they should be happy to see them restored. "

The result of the deliberations is the formal grant by Duchess Mary ofthe "Groot Privilegie, " or Great Privilege, the Magna Charta of Holland. Although this instrument was afterwards violated, and indeed abolished, it became the foundation of the republic. It was a recapitulation andrecognition of ancient rights, not an acquisition of new privileges. Itwas a restoration, not a revolution. Its principal points deserveattention from those interested in the political progress of mankind. 

"The duchess shall not marry without consent of the estates of herprovinces. All offices in her gift shall be conferred on natives only. Noman shall fill two offices. No office shall be farmed. The 'Great Counciland Supreme Court of Holland' is re-established. Causes shall be broughtbefore it on appeal from the ordinary courts. It shall have no originaljurisdiction of matters within the cognizance of the provincial andmunicipal tribunals. The estates and cities are guaranteed in their rightnot to be summoned to justice beyond the limits of their territory. Thecities, in common with all the provinces of the Netherlands, may holddiets as often ten and at such places as they choose. No new taxes shallbe imposed but by consent of the provincial estates. Neither the duchessnor her descendants shall begin either an offensive or defensive warwithout consent of the estates. In case a war be illegally undertaken, the estates are not bound to contribute to its maintenance. In all publicand legal documents, the Netherland language shall be employed. Thecommands of the duchess shall be invalid, if conflicting with theprivileges of a city. 

"The seat of the Supreme Council is transferred from Mechlin to theHague. No money shall be coined, nor its value raised or lowered, but byconsent of the estates. Cities are not to be compelled to contribute torequests which they have not voted. The sovereign shall come in personbefore the estates, to make his request for supplies. "

Here was good work. The land was rescued at a blow from the helplesscondition to which it had been reduced. This summary annihilation of allthe despotic arrangements of Charles was enough to raise him from histomb. The law, the sword, the purse, were all taken from the hand of thesovereign and placed within the control of parliament. Such sweepingreforms, if maintained, would restore health to the body politic. Theygave, moreover, an earnest of what was one day to arrive. Certainly, forthe fifteenth century, the "Great Privilege" was a reasonably liberalconstitution. Where else upon earth, at that day, was there half so muchliberty as was thus guaranteed? The congress of the Netherlands, according to their Magna Charta, had power to levy all taxes, to regulatecommerce and manufactures, to declare war, to coin money, to raise armiesand navies. The executive was required to ask for money in person, couldappoint only natives to office, recognized the right of disobedience inhis subjects, if his commands should conflict with law, and acknowledgedhimself bound by decisions of courts of justice. The cities appointedtheir own magistrates, held diets at their own pleasure, made their localby-laws and saw to their execution. Original cognizance of legal mattersbelonged to the municipal courts, appellate jurisdiction to the supremetribunal, in which the judges were appointed by the sovereign. Theliberty of the citizen against arbitrary imprisonment was amply providedfor. The 'jus de non evocando', the habeas corpus of Holland, wasre-established. 

Truly, here was a fundamental law which largely, roundly, and reasonablyrecognized the existence of a people with hearts, heads, and hands oftheir own. It was a vast step in advance of natural servitude, the dogmaof the dark ages. It was a noble and temperate vindication of naturalliberty, the doctrine of more enlightened days. To no people in the worldmore than to the stout burghers of Flanders and Holland belongs the honorof having battled audaciously and perennially in behalf of human rights. 

Similar privileges to the great charter of Holland are granted to manyother provinces; especially to Flanders, ever ready to stand forward infierce vindication of freedom. For a season all is peace and joy; but theduchess is young, weak, and a woman. There is no lack of intriguingpoliticians, reactionary councillors. There is a cunning old king in thedistance, lying in wait; seeking what he can devour. A mission goes fromthe estates to France. The well-known tragedy of Imbrecourt and Hugonetoccurs. Envoys from the states, they dare to accept secret instructionsfrom the duchess to enter into private negotiations with the Frenchmonarch, against their colleagues--against the great charter--againsttheir country. Sly Louis betrays them, thinking that policy the moreexpedient. They are seized in Ghent, rapidly tried, and as rapidlybeheaded by the enraged burghers. All the entreaties of the Lady Mary, who, dressed in mourning garments, with dishevelled hair, unloosedgirdle, and streaming eyes; appears at the town-house and afterwards inthe market place, humbly to intercede for her servants, are fruitlessThere is no help for the juggling diplomatists. The punishment was sharp. Was it more severe and sudden than that which betrayed monarchs usuallyinflict? Would the Flemings, at that critical moment, have deserved theirfreedom had they not taken swift and signal vengeance for this firstinfraction of their newly recognized rights? Had it not been weakness tospare the traitors who had thus stained the childhood of the national joyat liberty regained?

IX. 

Another step, and a wide one, into the great stream of European history. The Lady Mary espouses the Archduke Maximilian. The Netherlands are aboutto become Habsburg property. The Ghenters reject the pretensions of thedauphin, and select for husband of their duchess the very man whom herfather had so stupidly rejected. It had been a wiser choice for Charlesthe Bold than for the Netherlanders. The marriage takes place on the 18thof August, 1477. Mary of Burgundy passes from the guardianship of Ghentburghers into that of the emperor's son. The crafty husband allieshimself with the city party, feeling where the strength lies. He knowsthat the voracious Kabbeljaws have at last swallowed the Hooks, and runaway with them. Promising himself future rights of reconsideration, he isliberal in promises to the municipal party. In the mean time he isgovernor and guardian of his wife and her provinces. His children are toinherit the Netherlands and all that therein is. What can be moreconsistent than laws of descent, regulated by right divine? At thebeginning of the century, good Philip dispossesses Jacqueline, becausefemales can not inherit. At its close, his granddaughter succeeds to theproperty, and transmits it to her children. Pope and emperor maintainboth positions with equal logic. The policy and promptness of Maximilianare as effective as the force and fraud of Philip. The Lady Mary fallsfrom her horse and dies. Her son, Philip, four years of age, isrecognized as successor. Thus the house of Burgundy is followed by thatof Austria, the fifth and last family which governed Holland, previouslyto the erection of the republic. Maximilian is recognized by theprovinces as governor and guardian, during the minority of his children. Flanders alone refuses. The burghers, ever prompt in action, takepersonal possession of the child Philip, and carry on the government inhis name. A commission of citizens and nobles thus maintain theirauthority against Maximilian for several years. In 1488, the archduke, now King of the Romans, with a small force of cavalry, attempts to takethe city of Bruges, but the result is a mortifying one to the Roman king. The citizens of Bruges take him. Maximilian, with several councillors, iskept a prisoner in a house on the market-place. The magistrates are allchanged, the affairs of government conducted in the name of the youngPhilip alone. Meantime, the estates of the other Netherlands assemble atGhent; anxious, unfortunately, not for the national liberty, but for thatof the Roman king. Already Holland, torn again by civil feuds, andblinded by the artifices of Maximilian, has deserted, for a season, thegreat cause to which Flanders has remained so true. At last, a treaty ismade between the archduke and the Flemings. Maximilian is to be regent ofthe other provinces; Philip, under guardianship of a council, is togovern Flanders. Moreover, a congress of all the provinces is to besummoned annually, to provide for the general welfare. Maximilian signsand swears to the treaty on the 16th May, 1488. He swears, also, todismiss all foreign troops within four days. Giving hostages for hisfidelity, he is set at liberty. What are oaths and hostages whenprerogative, and the people are contending? Emperor Frederic sends to hisson an army under the Duke of Saxony. The oaths are broken, the hostagesleft to their fate. The struggle lasts a year, but, at the end of it, theFlemings are subdued. What could a single province effect, when itssister states, even liberty-loving Holland, had basely abandoned thecommon cause? A new treaty is made, (Oct. 1489). Maximilian obtainsuncontrolled guardianship of his son, absolute dominion over Flanders andthe other provinces. The insolent burghers are severely punished forremembering that they had been freemen. The magistrates of Ghent, Bruges, and Ypres, in black garments, ungirdled, bare-headed, and kneeling, arecompelled to implore the despot's forgiveness, and to pay three hundredthousand crowns of gold as its price. After this, for a brief season, order reigns in Flanders. 

The course of Maximilian had been stealthy, but decided. Allying himselfwith the city party, he had crushed the nobles. The power thus obtained, he then turned against the burghers. Step by step he had trampled out theliberties which his wife and himself had sworn to protect. He had spurnedthe authority of the "Great Privilege, " and all other charters. Burgomasters and other citizens had been beheaded in great numbers forappealing to their statutes against the edicts of the regent, for votingin favor of a general congress according to the unquestionable law. Hehad proclaimed that all landed estates should, in lack of heirs male, escheat to his own exchequer. He had debased the coin of the country, andthereby authorized unlimited swindling on the part of all his agents, from stadholders down to the meanest official. If such oppression andknavery did not justify the resistance of the Flemings to theguardianship of Maximilian, it would be difficult to find any reasonablecourse in political affairs save abject submission to authority. 

In 1493, Maximilian succeeds to the imperial throne, at the death of hisfather. In the following year his son, Philip the Fair, now seventeenyears of age, receives the homage of the different states of theNetherlands. He swears to maintain only the privileges granted by Philipand Charles of Burgundy, or their ancestors, proclaiming null and voidall those which might have been acquired since the death of Charles. Holland, Zeland, and the other provinces accept him upon theseconditions, thus ignominiously, and without a struggle, relinquishing theGreat Privilege, and all similar charters. 

Friesland is, for a brief season, politically separated from the rest ofthe country. Harassed and exhausted by centuries of warfare, foreign, anddomestic, the free Frisians, at the suggestion or command of EmperorMaximilian, elect the Duke of Saxony as their Podesta. The sovereignprince, naturally proving a chief magistrate far from democratic, getshimself acknowledged, or submitted to, soon afterwards, as legitimatesovereign of Friesland. Seventeen years afterward Saxony sells thesovereignty to the Austrian house for 350, 000 crowns. This littlecountry, whose statutes proclaimed her to be "free as the wind, as longas it blew, " whose institutions Charlemagne had honored and leftunmolested, who had freed herself with ready poniard from Norman tyranny, who never bowed her neck to feudal chieftain, nor to the papal yoke, nowdriven to madness and suicide by the dissensions of her wild children, forfeits at last her independent existence. All the provinces are thusunited in a common servitude, and regret, too late, their supineness at amoment when their liberties might yet have been vindicated. Their ancientand cherished charters, which their bold ancestors had earned with thesweat of their brows and the blood of their hearts, are at the mercy ofan autocrat, and liable to be superseded by his edicts. 

In 1496, the momentous marriage of Philip the Fair with Joanna, daughterof Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile and Aragon, is solemnized. Of thisunion, in the first year of the century, is born the second Charlemagne, who is to unite Spain and the Netherlands, together with so many vast anddistant realms, under a single sceptre. Six years afterwards (Sept. 25, 1506), Philip dies at Burgos. A handsome profligate, devoted to hispleasures, and leaving the cares of state to his ministers, Philip, "croit-conseil, " is the bridge over which the house of Habsburg passes toalmost universal monarchy, but, in himself, is nothing. 

X. 

Two prudent marriages, made by Austrian archdukes within twenty years, have altered the face of the earth. The stream, which we have beentracing from its source, empties itself at last into the ocean of aworld-empire. Count Dirk the First, lord of a half-submerged corner ofEurope, is succeeded by Count Charles the Second of Holland, better knownas Charles the Fifth, King of Spain, Sicily, and Jerusalem, Duke ofMilan, Emperor of Germany, Dominator in Asia and Africa, autocrat of halfthe world. The leading events of his brilliant reign are familiar toevery child. The Netherlands now share the fate of so large a group ofnations, a fate, to these provinces, most miserable. The weddings ofAustria Felix were not so prolific of happiness to her subjects as toherself. It can never seem just or reasonable that the destiny of manymillions of human beings should depend upon the marriage-settlements ofone man with one woman, and a permanent, prosperous empire can never bereared upon so frail a foundation. The leading thought of the firstCharlemagne was a noble and a useful one, nor did his imperial schemeseem chimerical, even although time, wiser than monarchs or lawgivers, was to prove it impracticable. To weld into one great whole the varioustribes of Franks, Frisians, Saxons, Lombards, Burgundians, and others, still in their turbulent youth, and still composing one great Teutonicfamily; to enforce the mutual adhesion of naturally coherent masses, allof one lineage, one language, one history, and which were only beginningto exhibit their tendencies to insulation, to acquiesce in a variety oflocal laws and customs, while an iron will was to concentrate a vast, buthomogeneous, people into a single nation; to raise up from the grave ofcorrupt and buried Rome a fresh, vigorous, German, Christian empire; thiswas a reasonable and manly thought. Far different the conception of thesecond Charlemagne. To force into discordant union, tribes which, forseven centuries, had developed themselves into hostile nations, separatedby geography and history, customs and laws, to combine many millionsunder one sceptre, not because of natural identity, but for the sake ofcomposing one splendid family property, to establish unity byannihilating local institutions, to supersede popular and liberalcharters by the edicts of a central despotism, to do battle with thewhole spirit of an age, to regard the souls as well as the bodies of vastmultitudes as the personal property of one individual, to strive for theperpetuation in a single house of many crowns, which accident hadblended, and to imagine the consecration of the whole system by placingthe pope's triple diadem forever upon the imperial head of theHabsburgs;--all this was not the effort of a great, constructive genius, but the selfish scheme of an autocrat. 

The union of no two countries could be less likely to prove advantageousor agreeable than that of the Netherlands and Spain. They were widelyseparated geographically, while in history, manners, and politics, theywere utterly opposed to each other. Spain, which had but just assumed theform of a single state by the combination of all its kingdoms, with itshaughty nobles descended from petty kings, and arrogating almostsovereign power within their domains, with its fierce enthusiasm for theCatholic religion, which, in the course of long warfare with theSaracens, had become the absorbing characteristic of a whole nation, withits sparse population scattered over a wide and stern country, with amilitary spirit which led nearly all classes to prefer poverty to thewealth attendant upon degrading pursuits of trade;--Spain, with hergloomy, martial, and exaggerated character, was the absolute contrast ofthe Netherlands. 

These provinces had been rarely combined into a whole, but there wasnatural affinity in their character, history, and position. There waslife, movement, bustling activity every where. An energetic populationswarmed in all the flourishing cities which dotted the surface of acontracted and highly cultivated country. Their ships were the carriersfor the world;--their merchants, if invaded in their rights, engaged invigorous warfare with their own funds and their own frigates; theirfabrics were prized over the whole earth; their burghers possessed thewealth of princes, lived with royal luxury, and exercised vast politicalinfluence; their love of liberty was their predominant passion. Theirreligious ardor had not been fully awakened; but the events of the nextgeneration were to prove that in no respect more than in the religioussentiment, were the two races opposed to each other. It was as certainthat the Netherlanders would be fierce reformers as that the Spaniardswould be uncompromising persecutors. Unhallowed was the union betweennations thus utterly contrasted. 

Philip the Fair and Ferdinand had detested and quarrelled with each otherfrom the beginning. The Spaniards and Flemings participated in the mutualantipathy, and hated each other cordially at first sight. Theunscrupulous avarice of the Netherland nobles in Spain, their graspingand venal ambition, enraged and disgusted the haughty Spaniards. Thisinternational malignity furnishes one of the keys to a properunderstanding of the great revolt in the next reign. 

The provinces, now all united again under an emperor, were treated, opulent and powerful as they were, as obscure dependencies. The regencyover them was entrusted by Charles to his near relatives, who governed inthe interest of his house, not of the country. His course towards themupon the religious question will be hereafter indicated. The politicalcharacter of his administration was typified, and, as it were, dramatized, on the occasion of the memorable insurrection at Ghent. Forthis reason, a few interior details concerning that remarkable event, seem requisite. 

XI. 

Ghent was, in all respects, one of the most important cities in Europe. Erasmus, who, as a Hollander and a courtier, was not likely to be partialto the turbulent Flemings, asserted that there was no town in allChristendom to be compared to it for size, power, political constitution, or the culture of its inhabitants. It was, said one of its inhabitants atthe epoch of the insurrection, rather a country than a city. The activityand wealth of its burghers were proverbial. The bells were rung daily, and the drawbridges over the many arms of the river intersecting thestreets were raised, in order that all business might be suspended, whilethe armies of workmen were going to or returning from their labors. Asearly as the fourteenth century, the age of the Arteveldes, Froissartestimated the number of fighting men whom Ghent could bring into thefield at eighty thousand. The city, by its jurisdiction over many largebut subordinate towns, disposed of more than its own immediatepopulation, which has been reckoned as high as two hundred thousand. 

Placed in the midst of well cultivated plains, Ghent was surrounded bystrong walls, the external circuit of which measured nine miles. Itsstreets and squares were spacious and elegant, its churches and otherpublic buildings numerous and splendid. The sumptuous church of SaintJohn or Saint Bavon, where Charles the Fifth had been baptized, theancient castle whither Baldwin Bras de Fer had brought the daughter ofCharles the Bald, the city hall with its graceful Moorish front, thewell-known belfry, where for three centuries had perched the dragon sentby the Emperor Baldwin of Flanders from Constantinople, and where swungthe famous Roland, whose iron tongue had called the citizens, generationafter generation, to arms, whether to win battles over foreign kings atthe head of their chivalry, or to plunge their swords in each others'breasts, were all conspicuous in the city and celebrated in the land. Especially the great bell was the object of the burghers' affection, and, generally, of the sovereign's hatred; while to all it seemed, as it were, a living historical personage, endowed with the human powers and passionswhich it had so long directed and inflamed. 

The constitution of the city was very free. It was a little republic inall but name. Its population was divided into fifty-two guilds ofmanufacturers and into thirty-two tribes of weavers; each fraternityelecting annually or biennally its own deans and subordinate officers. The senate, which exercised functions legislative, judicial, andadministrative, subject of course to the grand council of Mechlin and tothe sovereign authority, consisted of twenty-six members. These wereappointed partly from the upper class, or the men who lived upon theirmeans, partly from the manufacturers in general, and partly from theweavers. They were chosen by a college of eight electors, who wereappointed by the sovereign on nomination by the citizens. The whole city, in its collective capacity, constituted one of the four estates (Membra)of the province of Flanders. It is obvious that so much liberty of formand of fact, added to the stormy character by which its citizens weredistinguished, would be most offensive in the eyes of Charles, and thatthe delinquencies of the little commonwealth would be represented in themost glaring colors by all those quiet souls, who preferred thetranquillity of despotism to the turbulence of freedom. The city claimed, moreover, the general provisions of the "Great Privilege" of the LadyMary, the Magna Charta, which, according to the monarchical party, hadbeen legally abrogated by Maximilian. The liberties of the town had alsobeen nominally curtailed by the "calf-skin" (Kalf Vel). By thiscelebrated document, Charles the Fifth, then fifteen years of age, hadbeen made to threaten with condign punishment all persons who shouldmaintain that he had sworn at his inauguration to observe any privilegesor charters claimed by the Ghenters before the peace of Cadsand. 

The immediate cause of the discontent, the attempt to force from Flandersa subsidy of four hundred thousand caroli, as the third part of thetwelve hundred thousand granted by the states of the Netherlands, and theresistance of Ghent in opposition to the other three members of theprovince, will, of course, be judged differently, according as thesympathies are stronger with popular rights or with prerogative. Thecitizens claimed that the subsidy could only be granted by the unanimousconsent of the four estates of the province. Among other proofs of thistheir unquestionable right, they appealed to a muniment, which had neverexisted, save in the imagination of the credulous populace. At a certainremote epoch, one of the Counts of Flanders, it was contended, hadgambled away his countship to the Earl of Holland, but had beenextricated from his dilemma by the generosity of Ghent. The burghers ofthe town had paid the debts and redeemed the sovereignty of their lord, and had thereby gained, in return, a charter, called the Bargain ofFlanders (Koop van Flandern). Among the privileges granted by thisdocument, was an express stipulation that no subsidy should ever begranted by the province without the consent of Ghent. This charter wouldhave been conclusive in the present emergency, had it not labored underthe disadvantage of never having existed. It was supposed by many thatthe magistrates, some of whom were favorable to government, had hiddenthe document. Lieven Pyl, an ex-senator, was supposed to be privy to itsconcealment. He was also, with more justice, charged with an act of greatbaseness and effrontery. Reputed by the citizens to carry to the QueenRegent their positive refusal to grant the subsidy, he had, on thecontrary, given an answer, in their name, in the affirmative. For thesedelinquencies, the imaginary and the real, he was inhumanly tortured andafterwards beheaded. "I know, my children, " said he upon the scaffold, "that you will be grieved when you have seen my blood flow, and that youwill regret me when it is too late. " It does not appear, however, thatthere was any especial reason to regret him, however sanguinary thepunishment which had requited his broken faith. 

The mischief being thus afoot, the tongue of Roland, and theeasily-excited spirits of the citizens, soon did the rest. Ghent brokeforth into open insurrection. They had been willing to enlist and paytroops under their own banners, but they had felt outraged at theenormous contribution demanded of them for a foreign war, undertaken inthe family interests of their distant master. They could not find the"Bargain of Flanders, " but they got possession of the odious "calf skin, "which was solemnly cut in two by the dean of the weavers. It was thentorn in shreds by the angry citizens, many of whom paraded the streetswith pieces of the hated document stuck in their caps, like plumes. Fromthese demonstrations they proceeded to intrigues with Francis the First. He rejected them, and gave notice of their overtures to Charles, who nowresolved to quell the insurrection, at once. Francis wrote, begging thatthe Emperor would honor him by coming through France; "wishing to assureyou, " said he, "my lord and good brother, by this letter, written andsigned by my hand, upon my honor, and on the faith of a prince, and ofthe best brother you have, that in passing through my kingdom everypossible honor and hospitality will be offered you, even as they could beto myself. " Certainly, the French king, after such profuse and voluntarypledges, to confirm which he, moreover, offered his two sons and othergreat individuals as hostages, could not, without utterly disgracinghimself, have taken any unhandsome advantage of the Emperor's presence inhis dominions. The reflections often made concerning the high-mindedchivalry of Francis, and the subtle knowledge of human nature displayedby Charles upon the occasion, seem, therefore, entirely superfluous. TheEmperor came to Paris. "Here, " says a citizen of Ghent, at the time, whohas left a minute account of the transaction upon record, but whosesympathies were ludicrously with the despot and against his owntownspeople, "here the Emperor was received as if the God of Paradise haddescended. " On the 9th of February, 1540, he left Brussels; on the 14thhe came to Ghent. His entrance into the city lasted more than six hours. Four thousand lancers, one thousand archers, five thousand halberdmen andmusqueteers composed his bodyguard, all armed to the teeth and ready forcombat. The Emperor rode in their midst, surrounded by "cardinals, archbishops, bishops, and other great ecclesiastical lords, " so that theterrors of the Church were combined with the panoply of war to affrightthe souls of the turbulent burghers. A brilliant train of "dukes, princes, earls, barons, grand masters, and seignors, together with mostof the Knights of the Fleece, " were, according to the testimony of thesame eyewitness, in attendance upon his Majesty. This unworthy son ofGhent was in ecstasies with the magnificence displayed upon the occasion. There was such a number of "grand lords, members of sovereign houses, bishops, and other ecclesiastical dignitaries going about the streets, that, " as the poor soul protested with delight, "there was nobody else tobe met with. " Especially the fine clothes of these distinguished guestsexcited his warmest admiration. It was wonderful to behold, he said, "thenobility and great richness of the princes and seignors, displayed aswell in their beautiful furs, martins and sables, as in the great chainsof fine gold which they wore twisted round their necks, and the pearlsand precious stones in their bonnets and otherwise, which they displayedin great abundance. It was a very triumphant thing to see them so richlydressed and accoutred. "

An idea may be formed of the size and wealth of the city at this period, from the fact that it received and accommodated sixty thousand strangers, with their fifteen thousand horses, upon the occasion of the Emperor'svisit. Charles allowed a month of awful suspense to intervene between hisarrival and his vengeance. Despair and hope alternated during theinterval. On the 17th of March, the spell was broken by the execution ofnineteen persons, who were beheaded as ringleaders. On the 29th of April, he pronounced sentence upon the city. The hall where it was rendered wasopen to all comers, and graced by the presence of the Emperor, the QueenRegent, and the great functionaries of Court, Church, and State. Thedecree, now matured, was read at length. It annulled all the charters, privileges, and laws of Ghent. It confiscated all its public property, rents, revenues, houses, artillery, munitions of war, and in generalevery thing which the corporation, or the traders, each and all, possessed in common. In particular, the great bell--Roland was condemnedand sentenced to immediate removal. It was decreed that the four hundredthousand florins, which had caused the revolt, should forthwith be paid, together with an additional fine by Ghent of one hundred and fiftythousand, besides six thousand a year, forever after. In place of theirancient and beloved constitution, thus annihilated at a blow, waspromulgated a new form of municipal government of the simplest kind, according to which all officers were in future to be appointed by himselfand the guilds, to be reduced to half their number; shorn of allpolitical power, and deprived entirely of self-government. It was, moreover, decreed, that the senators, their pensionaries, clerks andsecretaries, thirty notable burghers, to be named by the Emperor, withthe great dean and second dean of the weavers, all dressed in blackrobes, without their chains, and bareheaded, should appear upon anappointed day, in company with fifty persons from the guilds, and fiftyothers, to be arbitrarily named, in their shirts, with halters upon theirnecks. This large number of deputies, as representatives of the city, were then to fall upon their knees before the Emperor, say in a loud andintelligible voice, by the mouth of one of their clerks, that they wereextremely sorry for the disloyalty, disobedience, infraction of laws, commotions, rebellion, and high treason, of which they had been guilty, promise that they would never do the like again, and humbly implore him, for the sake of the Passion of Jesus Christ, to grant them mercy andforgiveness. 

The third day of May was appointed for the execution of the sentence. Charles, who was fond of imposing exhibitions and prided himself uponarranging them with skill, was determined that this occasion should belong remembered by all burghers throughout his dominions who might bedisposed to insist strongly upon their municipal rights. The streets werealive with troops: cavalry and infantry in great numbers keeping strictguard at every point throughout the whole extent of the city; for it wasknown that the hatred produced by the sentence was most deadly, and thatnothing but an array of invincible force could keep those hostilesentiments in check. The senators in their black mourning robes, theother deputies in linen shirts, bareheaded, with halters on their necks, proceeded, at the appointed hour, from the senate house to the imperialresidence. High on his throne, with the Queen Regent at his side, surrounded by princes, prelates and nobles, guarded by his archers andhalberdiers, his crown on his head and his sceptre in his hand, theEmperor, exalted, sat. The senators and burghers, in their robes cfhumiliation, knelt in the dust at his feet. The prescribed words ofcontrition and of supplication for mercy were then read by thepensionary, all the deputies remaining upon their knees, and many of themcrying bitterly with rage and shame. "What principally distressed them, "said the honest citizen, whose admiration for the brilliant accoutrementof the princes and prelates has been recorded, "was to have the halter ontheir necks, which they found hard to bear, and, if they had not beencompelled, they would rather have died than submit to it. "

As soon as the words had been all spoken by the pensionary, the Emperor, whose cue was now to appear struggling with mingled emotions ofreasonable wrath and of natural benignity, performed his part with muchdramatic effect. "He held himself coyly for a little time, " says theeye-witness, "without saying a word; deporting himself as though he wereconsidering whether or not he would grant the pardon for which theculprits had prayed. " Then the Queen Regent enacted her share in theshow. Turning to his Majesty "with all reverence, honor and humility, shebegged that he would concede forgiveness, in honor of his nativity, whichhad occurred in that city. "

Upon this the Emperor "made a fine show of benignity, " and replied "verysweetly" that in consequence of his "fraternal love for her, by reason ofhis being a gentle and virtuous prince, who preferred mercy to the rigorof justice, and in view of their repentance, he would accord his pardonto the citizens. "

The Netherlands, after this issue to the struggle of Ghent, were reduced, practically, to a very degraded condition. The form of localself-government remained, but its spirit, when invoked, only arose to bederided. The supreme court of Mechlin, as in the days of Charles theBold, was again placed in despotic authority above the ancient charters. Was it probable that the lethargy of provinces, which had reached so higha point of freedom only to be deprived of it at last, could endureforever? Was it to be hoped that the stern spirit of religiousenthusiasm, allying itself with the--keen instinct of civil liberty, would endue the provinces with strength to throw off the Spanish yoke?

XII. 

It is impossible to comprehend the character of the great Netherlandrevolt in the sixteenth century without taking a rapid retrospectivesurvey of the religious phenomena exhibited in the provinces. Theintroduction of Christianity has been already indicated. From theearliest times, neither prince, people, nor even prelates were verydutiful to the pope. As the papal authority made progress, strongresistance was often made to its decrees. The bishops of Utrecht weredependent for their wealth and territory upon the good will of theEmperor. They were the determined opponents of Hildebrand, warm adherentsof the Hohenstaufers-Ghibelline rather than Guelph. Heresy was a plant ofearly growth in the Netherlands. As early as the beginning of the 12thcentury, the notorious Tanchelyn preached at Antwerp, attacking theauthority of the pope and of all other ecclesiastics; scoffing at theceremonies and sacraments of the Church. Unless his character and careerhave been grossly misrepresented, he was the most infamous of the manyimpostors who have so often disgraced the cause of religious reformation. By more than four centuries, he anticipated the licentiousness andgreediness manifested by a series of false prophets, and was the first toturn both the stupidity of a populace and the viciousness of a priesthoodto his own advancement; an ambition which afterwards reached its mostsignal expression in the celebrated John of Leyden. 

The impudence of Tanchelyn and the superstition of his followers seemalike incredible. All Antwerp was his harem. He levied, likewise, vastsums upon his converts, and whenever he appeared in public, his appareland pomp were befitting an emperor. Three thousand armed satellitesescorted his steps and put to death all who resisted his commands. Sogroveling became the superstition of his followers that they drank of thewater in which, he had washed, and treasured it as a divine elixir. Advancing still further in his experiments upon human credulity, heannounced his approaching marriage with the Virgin Mary, bade all hisdisciples to the wedding, and exhibited himself before an immense crowdin company with an image of his holy bride. He then ordered the people toprovide for the expenses of the nuptials and the dowry of his wife, placing a coffer upon each side of the image, to receive thecontributions of either sex. Which is the most wonderful manifestation inthe history of this personage--the audacity of the impostor, or thebestiality of his victims? His career was so successful in theNetherlands that he had the effrontery to proceed to Rome, promulgatingwhat he called his doctrines as he went. He seems to have beenassassinated by a priest in an obscure brawl, about the year 1115. 

By the middle of the 12th century, other and purer heresiarchs hadarisen. Many Netherlanders became converts to the doctrines of Waldo. From that period until the appearance of Luther, a succession ofsects--Waldenses, Albigenses, Perfectists, Lollards, Poplicans, Arnaldists, Bohemian Brothers--waged perpetual but unequal warfare withthe power and depravity of the Church, fertilizing with their blood thefuture field of the Reformation. Nowhere was the persecution of hereticsmore relentless than in the Netherlands. Suspected persons were subjectedto various torturing but ridiculous ordeals. After such trial, death byfire was the usual but, perhaps, not the most severe form of execution. In Flanders, monastic ingenuity had invented another most painfulpunishment for Waldenses and similar malefactors. A criminal whose guilthad been established by the hot iron, hot ploughshare, boiling kettle, orother logical proof, was stripped and bound to the stake:--he was thenflayed, from the neck to the navel, while swarms of bees were let looseto fasten upon his bleeding flesh and torture him to a death of exquisiteagony. 

Nevertheless heresy increased in the face of oppression The Scriptures, translated by Waldo into French, were rendered into Netherland rhyme, andthe converts to the Vaudois doctrine increased in numbers and boldness. At the same time the power and luxury of the clergy was waxing daily. Thebishops of Utrecht, no longer the defenders of the people againstarbitrary power, conducted themselves like little popes. Yielding indignity neither to king nor kaiser, they exacted homage from the mostpowerful princes of the Netherlands. The clerical order became the mostprivileged of all. The accused priest refused to acknowledge the temporaltribunals. The protection of ecclesiastical edifices was extended overall criminals and fugitives from justice--a beneficent result in thosesanguinary ages, even if its roots were sacerdotal pride. To establish anaccusation against a bishop, seventy-two witnesses were necessary;against a deacon, twenty-seven; against an inferior dignitary, seven;while two were sufficient to convict a layman. The power to read andwrite helped the clergy to much wealth. Privileges and charters frompetty princes, gifts and devises from private persons, were documentswhich few, save ecclesiastics, could draw or dispute. Not content, moreover, with their territories and their tithings, the churchmenperpetually devised new burthens upon the peasantry. Ploughs, sickles, horses, oxen, all implements of husbandry, were taxed for the benefit ofthose who toiled not, but who gathered into barns. In the course of thetwelfth century, many religious houses, richly endowed with lands andother property, were founded in the Netherlands. Was hand or voice raisedagainst clerical encroachment--the priests held ever in readiness adeadly weapon of defence: a blasting anathema was thundered against theirantagonist, and smote him into submission. The disciples of Him whoordered his followers to bless their persecutors, and to love theirenemies, invented such Christian formulas as these:--"In the name of theFather, the Son, the Holy Ghost, the blessed Virgin Mary, John theBaptist, Peter and Paul, and all other Saints in Heaven, do we curse andcut off from our Communion him who has thus rebelled against us. May thecurse strike him in his house, barn, bed, field, path, city, castle. Mayhe be cursed in battle, accursed in praying, in speaking, in silence, ineating, in drinking, in sleeping. May he be accursed in his taste, hearing, smell, and all his senses. May the curse blast his eyes, head, and his body, from his crown to the soles of his feet. I conjure you, Devil, and all your imps, that you take no rest till you have brought himto eternal shame; till he is destroyed by drowning or hanging, till he istorn to pieces by wild beasts, or consumed by fire. Let his childrenbecome orphans, his wife a widow. I command you, Devil, and all yourimps, that even as I now blow out these torches, you do immediatelyextinguish the light from his eyes. So be it--so be it. Amen. Amen. " Sospeaking, the curser was wont to blow out two waxen torches which he heldin his hands, and, with this practical illustration, the anathema wascomplete. 

Such insane ravings, even in the mouth of some impotent beldame, wereenough to excite a shudder, but in that dreary epoch, these curses fromthe lips of clergymen were deemed sufficient to draw down celestiallightning upon the head, not of the blasphemer, but of his victim. Men, who trembled neither at sword nor fire, cowered like slaves before suchhorrid imprecations, uttered by tongues gifted, as it seemed, withsuperhuman power. Their fellow-men shrank from the wretches thus blasted, and refused communication with them as unclean and abhorred. 

By the end of the thirteenth century, however, the clerical power wasalready beginning to decline. It was not the corruption of the Church, but its enormous wealth which engendered the hatred, with which it was bymany regarded. Temporal princes and haughty barons began to dispute theright of ecclesiastics to enjoy vast estates, while refusing the burthenof taxation, and unable to draw a sword for the common defence. At thisperiod, the Counts of Flanders, of Holland, and other Netherlandsovereigns, issued decrees, forbidding clerical institutions fromacquiring property, by devise, gift, purchase, or any other mode. Thedownfall of the rapacious and licentious knights-templar in the provincesand throughout Europe, was another severe blow administered at the sametime. The attacks upon Church abuses redoubled in boldness, as itsauthority declined. Towards the end of the fourteenth century, thedoctrines of Wicklif had made great progress in the land. Early in thefifteenth, the executions of Huss and Jerome of Prague, produce theBohemian rebellion. The Pope proclaims a crusade against the Hussites. Knights and prelates, esquires and citizens, enlist in the sacred cause, throughout Holland and its sister provinces; but many Netherlanders, whohad felt the might of Ziska's arm, come back, feeling more sympathy withthe heresy which they had attacked, than with the Church for which theyhad battled. 

Meantime, the restrictions imposed by Netherland sovereigns upon clericalrights to hold or acquire property, become more stern and more general. On the other hand, with the invention of printing, the cause ofReformation takes a colossal stride in advance. A Bible, which, before, had cost five hundred crowns, now costs but five. The people acquire thepower of reading God's Word, or of hearing it read, for themselves. Thelight of truth dispels the clouds of superstition, as by a newrevelation. The Pope and his monks are found to bear, very often, butfaint resemblance to Jesus and his apostles. Moreover, the instinct ofself-interest sharpens the eye of the public. Many greedy priests, oflower rank, had turned shop-keepers in the Netherlands, and were growingrich by selling their wares, exempt from taxation, at a lower rate thanlay hucksters could afford. The benefit of clergy, thus taking the breadfrom the mouths of many, excites jealousy; the more so, as, besides theirmiscellaneous business, the reverend traders have a most lucrative branchof commerce from which other merchants are excluded. The sale ofabsolutions was the source of large fortunes to the priests. The enormousimpudence of this traffic almost exceeds belief. Throughout theNetherlands, the price current of the wares thus offered for sale, waspublished in every town and village. God's pardon for crimes alreadycommitted, or about to be committed, was advertised according to agraduated tariff. Thus, poisoning, for example, was absolved for elevenducats, six livres tournois. Absolution for incest was afforded atthirty-six livres, three ducats. Perjury came to seven livres and threecarlines. Pardon for murder, if not by poison, was cheaper. Even aparricide could buy forgiveness at God's tribunal at one ducat; fourlivres, eight carlines. Henry de Montfort, in the year 1448, purchasedabsolution for that crime at that price. Was it strange that a century orso of this kind of work should produce a Luther? Was it unnatural thatplain people, who loved the ancient Church, should rather desire to seeher purged of such blasphemous abuses, than to hear of St. Peter's domerising a little nearer to the clouds on these proceeds of commuted crime?

At the same time, while ecclesiastical abuses are thus augmenting, ecclesiastical power is diminishing in the Netherlands. The Church is nolonger able to protect itself against the secular aim. The halcyon daysof ban, book and candle, are gone. In 1459, Duke Philip of Burgundyprohibits the churches from affording protection to fugitives. Charlesthe Bold, in whose eyes nothing is sacred save war and the means ofmaking it, lays a heavy impost upon all clerical property. Upon beingresisted, he enforces collection with the armed hand. The sword and thepen, strength and intellect, no longer the exclusive servants orinstruments of priestcraft, are both in open revolt. Charles the Boldstorms one fortress, Doctor Grandfort, of Groningen, batters another. This learned Frisian, called "the light of the world, " friend andcompatriot of the great Rudolph Agricola, preaches throughout theprovinces, uttering bold denunciations of ecclesiastical error. He evendisputes the infallibility of the Pope, denies the utility of prayers forthe dead, and inveighs against the whole doctrine of purgatory andabsolution. 

With the beginning of the 16th century, the great Reformation wasactually alive. The name of Erasmus of Rotterdam was already celebrated;the man, who, according to Grotius, "so well showed the road to areasonable reformation. " But if Erasmus showed the road, he certainly didnot travel far upon it himself. Perpetual type of the quietist, themoderate man, he censured the errors of the Church with discriminationand gentleness, as if Borgianism had not been too long rampant at Rome, as if men's minds throughout Christendom were not too deeply stirred tobe satisfied with mild rebukes against sin, especially when the mildrebuker was in receipt of livings and salaries from the sinner. Insteadof rebukes, the age wanted reforms. The Sage of Rotterdam was a keenobserver, a shrewd satirist, but a moderate moralist. He loved ease, goodcompany, the soft repose of princely palaces, better than a life ofmartyrdom and a death at the stake. He was not of the stuff of whichmartyrs are made, as he handsomely confessed on more than one occasion. "Let others affect martyrdom, " he said, "for myself I am unworthy of thehonor;" and, at another time, "I am not of a mind, " he observed "toventure my life for the truth's sake; all men have not strength to endurethe martyr's death. For myself, if it came to the point, I should do nobetter than Simon Peter. " Moderate in all things, he would have liked, hesaid, to live without eating and drinking, although he never found itconvenient to do so, and he rejoiced when advancing age diminished histendency to other carnal pleasures in which he had moderately indulged. Although awake to the abuses of the Church, he thought Luther going toofast and too far. He began by applauding ended by censuring the monk ofWittemberg. The Reformation might have been delayed for centuries hadErasmus and other moderate men been the only reformers. He will long behonored for his elegant, Latinity. In the republic of letters, hisefforts to infuse a pure taste, a sound criticism, a love for thebeautiful and the classic, in place of the owlish pedantry which had solong flapped and hooted through mediaeval cloisters, will always be heldin grateful reverence. In the history of the religious Reformation, hisname seems hardly to deserve the commendations of Grotius. 

As the schism yawns, more and more ominously, throughout Christendom, theEmperor naturally trembles. Anxious to save the state, but being noantique Roman, he wishes to close the gulf, but with more convenience tohimself: He conceives the highly original plan of combining Church andEmpire under one crown. This is Maximilian's scheme for Churchreformation. An hereditary papacy, a perpetual pope-emperor, theCharlemagne and Hildebrand systems united and simplified--thus the worldmay yet be saved. "Nothing more honorable, nobler, better, could happento us, " writes Maximilian to Paul Lichtenstein (16th Sept. 1511), "thanto re-annex the said popedom--which properly belongs to us--to ourEmpire. Cardinal Adrian approves our reasons and encourages us toproceed, being of opinion that we should not have much trouble with thecardinals. It is much to be feared that the Pope may die of his presentsickness. He has lost his appetite, and fills himself with so much drinkthat his health is destroyed. As such matters can not be arranged withoutmoney, we have promised the cardinals, whom we expect to bring over, 300, 000 ducats, [Recall that the fine for redemption and pardon for thesin of murder was at that time one ducat. D. W. ] which we shall raise fromthe Fuggers, and make payable in Rome upon the appointed day. "

These business-like arrangements he communicates, two days afterwards, ina secret letter to his daughter Margaret, and already exults at hisfuture eminence, both in this world and the next. "We are sendingMonsieur de Gurce, " he says; "to make an agreement with the Pope, that wemay be taken as coadjutor, in order that, upon his death, we may be sureof the papacy, and, afterwards, of becoming a saint. After my decease, therefore, you will be constrained to adore me, of which I shall be veryproud. I am beginning to work upon the cardinals, in which affair two orthree hundred thousand ducats will be of great service. " The letter wassigned, "From the hand of your good father, Maximilian, future Pope. "

These intrigues are not destined, however, to be successful. Pope Juliuslives two years longer; Leo the Tenth succeeds; and, as Medici are notmuch prone to Church reformation some other scheme, and perhaps someother reformer, may be wanted. Meantime, the traffic in bulls ofabsolution becomes more horrible than ever. Money must be raised tosupply the magnificent extravagance of Rome. Accordingly, Christians, throughout Europe, are offered by papal authority, guarantees offorgiveness for every imaginable sin, "even for the rape of God's mother, if that were possible, " together with a promise of life eternal inParadise, all upon payment of the price affixed to each crime. TheNetherlands, like other countries, are districted and farmed for thecollection of this papal revenue. Much of the money thus raised, remainsin the hands of the vile collectors. Sincere Catholics, who love andhonor the ancient religion, shrink with horror at the spectacle offeredon every side. Criminals buying Paradise for money, monks spending themoney thus paid in gaming houses, taverns, and brothels; this seems, tothose who have studied their Testaments, a different scheme of salvationfrom the one promulgated by Christ. There has evidently been a departurefrom the system of earlier apostles. Innocent conservative souls are muchperplexed; but, at last, all these infamies arouse a giant to do battlewith the giant wrong. Martin Luther enters the lists, all alone, armedonly with a quiver filled with ninety-five propositions, and a bow whichcan send them all over Christendom with incredible swiftness. Within afew weeks the ninety-five propositions have flown through Germany, theNetherlands, Spain, and are found in Jerusalem. 

At the beginning, Erasmus encourages the bold friar. So long as the axeis not laid at the foot of the tree, which bears the poisonous but goldenfruit, the moderate man applauds the blows. "Luther's cause is consideredodious, " writes Erasmus to the Elector of Saxony, "because he has, at thesame time, attacked the bellies of the monks and the bulls of the Pope. "He complains that the zealous man had been attacked with roiling, but notwith arguments. He foresees that the work will have a bloody andturbulent result, but imputes the principal blame to the clergy. "Thepriests talk, " said he, "of absolution in such terms, that laymen can notstomach it. Luther has been for nothing more censured than for makinglittle of Thomas Aquinas; for wishing to diminish the absolution traffic;for having a low opinion of mendicant orders, and for respectingscholastic opinions less than the gospels. All this is consideredintolerable heresy. "

Erasmus, however, was offending both parties. A swarm of monks werealready buzzing about him for the bold language of his Commentaries andDialogues. He was called Erasmus for his errors--Arasmus because he wouldplough up sacred things--Erasmus because he had written himself anass--Behemoth, Antichrist, and many other names of similar import. Lutherwas said to have bought the deadly seed in his barn. The egg had beenlaid by Erasmus, hatched by Luther. On the other hand, he was reviled fornot taking side manfully with the reformer. The moderate man receivedmuch denunciation from zealots on either side. He soon clears himself, however, from all suspicions of Lutheranism. He is appalled at the fierceconflict which rages far and wide. He becomes querulous as the mightybesom sweeps away sacred dust and consecrated cobwebs. "Men should notattempt every thing at once, " he writes, "but rather step by step. Thatwhich men can not improve they must look at through the fingers. If thegodlessness of mankind requires such fierce physicians as Luther, if mancan not be healed with soothing ointments and cooling drinks, let us hopethat God will comfort, as repentant, those whom he has punished asrebellious. If the dove of Christ--not the owl of Minerva--would only flyto us, some measure might be put to the madness of mankind. "

Meantime the man, whose talk is not of doves and owls, the fiercephysician, who deals not with ointments and cooling draughts, stridespast the crowd of gentle quacks to smite the foul disease. Devils, thicker than tiles on house-tops, scare him not from his work. Bans andbulls, excommunications and decrees, are rained upon his head. Thepaternal Emperor sends down dire edicts, thicker than hail upon theearth. The Holy Father blasts and raves from Rome. Louvain doctorsdenounce, Louvain hangmen burn, the bitter, blasphemous books. Theimmoderate man stands firm in the storm, demanding argument instead ofillogical thunder; shows the hangmen and the people too, outside theElster gate at Wittenberg, that papal bulls will blaze as merrily asheretic scrolls. What need of allusion to events which changed theworld--which every child has learned--to the war of Titans, uprooting ofhoary trees and rock-ribbed hills, to the Worms diet, Peasant wars, thePatmos of Eisenach, and huge wrestlings with the Devil?

Imperial edicts are soon employed to suppress the Reformation in theNetherlands by force. The provinces, unfortunately; are the privateproperty of Charles, his paternal inheritance; and most paternally, according to his view of the matter, does he deal with them. Germany cannot be treated thus summarily, not being his heritage. "As it appears, "says the edict of 1521, "that the aforesaid Martin is not a man, but adevil under the form of a man, and clothed in the dress of a priest, thebetter to bring the human race to hell and damnation, therefore all hisdisciples and converts are to be punished with death and forfeiture ofall their goods. " This was succinct and intelligible. The bloody edict, issued at Worms, without even a pretence of sanction by the estates, wascarried into immediate effect. The papal inquisition was introduced intothe provinces to assist its operations. The bloody work, for which thereign of Charles is mainly distinguished in the Netherlands, now began. In 1523, July 1st, two Augustine monks were burned at Brussels, the firstvictims to Lutheranism in the provinces. Erasmus observed, with a sigh, that "two had been burned at Brussels, and that the city now beganstrenuously to favor Lutheranism. "

Pope Adrian the Sixth, the Netherland boat-maker's son and the Emperor'sancient tutor, was sufficiently alive to the sins of churchmen. Thehumble scholar of Utrecht was, at least, no Borgia. At the diet ofNuremberg, summoned to put down Luther, the honest Pope declared roundly, through the Bishop of Fabriane, that "these disorders had sprung from theSins of men, more especially from the sins of priests and prelates. Evenin the holy chair, " said he, "many horrible crimes have been committed. Many abuses have grown up in the ecclesiastical state. The contagiousdisease, spreading from the head to the members--from the Pope to lesserprelates--has spread far and wide, so that scarcely any one is to befound who does right, and who is free from infection. Nevertheless, theevils have become so ancient and manifold, that it will be necessary togo step by step. "

In those passionate days, the ardent reformers were as much outraged bythis pregnant confession as the ecclesiastics. It would indeed be a slowprocess, they thought, to move step by step in the Reformation, ifbetween each step, a whole century was to intervene. In vain did thegentle pontiff call upon Erasmus to assuage the stormy sea with hissmooth rhetoric. The Sage of Rotterdam was old and sickly; his day wasover. Adrian's head; too; languishes beneath the triple crown but twentymonths. He dies 13th Sept. , 1523, having arrived at the conviction, according to his epitaph, that the greatest misfortune of his life was tohave reigned. 

Another edict, published in the Netherlands, forbids all privateassemblies for devotion; all reading of the scriptures; all discussionswithin one's own doors concerning faith, the sacraments, the papalauthority, or other religious matter, under penalty of death. The edictswere no dead letter. The fires were kept constantly supplied with humanfuel by monks, who knew the art of burning reformers better than that ofarguing with them. The scaffold was the most conclusive of syllogisms, and used upon all occasions. Still the people remained unconvinced. Thousands of burned heretics had not made a single convert. 

A fresh edict renewed and sharpened the punishment for reading thescriptures in private or public. At the same time, the violent personalaltercation between Luther and Erasmus, upon predestination, togetherwith the bitter dispute between Luther and Zwingli concerning the realpresence, did more to impede the progress of the Reformation than ban oredict, sword or fire. The spirit of humanity hung her head, finding thatthe bold reformer had only a new dogma in place of the old ones, seeingthat dissenters, in their turn, were sometimes as ready as papists, withage, fagot, and excommunication. In 1526, Felix Mants, the anabaptist, isdrowned at Zurich, in obedience to Zwingli's pithy formula--'Qui iterummergit mergatur'. Thus the anabaptists, upon their first appearance, wereexposed to the fires of the Church and the water of the Zwinglians. 

There is no doubt that the anabaptist delusion was so ridiculous and soloathsome, as to palliate or at least render intelligible the wrath withwhich they were regarded by all parties. The turbulence of the sect wasalarming to constituted authorities, its bestiality disgraceful to thecause of religious reformation. The leaders were among the most depravedof human creatures, as much distinguished for licentiousness, blasphemyand cruelty as their followers for grovelling superstition. The evilspirit, driven out of Luther, seemed, in orthodox eyes, to have takenpossession of a herd of swine. The Germans, Muncer and Hoffmann, had beensucceeded, as chief prophets, by a Dutch baker, named Matthiszoon, ofHarlem; who announced himself as Enoch. Chief of this man's disciples wasthe notorious John Boccold, of Leyden. Under the government of thisprophet, the anabaptists mastered the city of Munster. Here theyconfiscated property, plundered churches, violated females, murdered menwho refused to join the gang, and, in briefs practised all the enormitieswhich humanity alone can conceive or perpetrate. The prophet proclaimedhimself King of Sion, and sent out apostles to preach his doctrines inGermany and the Netherlands. Polygamy being a leading article of thesystem, he exemplified the principle by marrying fourteen wives. Ofthese, the beautiful widow of Matthiszoon was chief, was called the Queenof Sion, and wore a golden crown. The prophet made many fruitless effortsto seize Amsterdam and Leyden. The armed invasion of the anabaptists wasrepelled, but their contagious madness spread. The plague broke forth inAmsterdam. On a cold winter's night, (February, 1535), seven men and fivewomen, inspired by the Holy Ghost, threw off their clothes and rushednaked and raving through the streets, shrieking "Wo, wo, wo! the wrath ofGod, the wrath of God!" When arrested, they obstinately refused to put onclothing. "We are, " they observed, "the naked truth. " In a day or two, these furious lunatics, who certainly deserved a madhouse rather than thescaffold, were all executed. The numbers of the sect increased with themartyrdom to which they were exposed, and the disorder spread to everypart of the Netherlands. Many were put to death in lingering torments, but no perceptible effect was produced by the chastisement. Meantime thegreat chief of the sect, the prophet John, was defeated by the forces ofthe Bishop of Munster, who recovered his city and caused the "King ofZion" to be pinched to death with red-hot tongs. 

Unfortunately the severity of government was not wreaked alone upon theprophet and his mischievous crew. Thousands and ten-thousands ofvirtuous, well-disposed men and women, who had as little sympathy withanabaptistical as with Roman depravity; were butchered in cold blood, under the sanguinary rule of Charles, in the Netherlands. In 1533, QueenDowager Mary of Hungary, sister of the Emperor, Regent of the provinces, the "Christian widow" admired by Erasmus, wrote to her brother that "inher opinion all heretics, whether repentant or not, should be prosecutedwith such severity as that error might be, at once, extinguished, carebeing only taken that the provinces were not entirely depopulated. " Withthis humane limitation, the "Christian Widow" cheerfully set herself tosuperintend as foul and wholesale a system of murder as was everorganized. In 1535, an imperial edict was issued at Brussels, condemningall heretics to death; repentant males to be executed with the sword, repentant females to be buried alive, the obstinate, of both sexes, to beburned. This and similar edicts were the law of the land for twentyyears, and rigidly enforced. Imperial and papal persecution continued itsdaily deadly work with such diligence as to make it doubtful whether thelimits set by the Regent Mary might not be overstepped. In the midst ofthe carnage, the Emperor sent for his son Philip, that he might receivethe fealty of the Netherlands as their future lord and master. Contemporaneously, a new edict was published at Brussels (29th April, 1549), confirming and reenacting all previous decrees in their mostsevere provisions. Thus stood religious matters in the Netherlands at theepoch of the imperial abdication. 

XIII. 

The civil institutions of the country had assumed their last provincialform, in the Burgundo-Austrian epoch. As already stated, their tendency, at a later period a vicious one, was to substitute fictitious personagesfor men. A chain of corporations was wound about the liberty of theNetherlands; yet that liberty had been originally sustained by the systemin which it, one day, might be strangled. The spirit of localself-government, always the life-blood of liberty, was often excessive inits manifestations. The centrifugal force had been too much developed, and, combining with the mutual jealousy of corporations, had often madethe nation weak against a common foe. Instead of popular rights therewere state rights, for the large cities, with extensive districts andvillages under their government, were rather petty states thanmunicipalities. Although the supreme legislative and executive functionsbelonged to the sovereign, yet each city made its by-laws, and possessed, beside, a body of statutes and regulations, made from time to time by itsown authority and confirmed by the prince. Thus a large portion, atleast, of the nation shared practically in the legislative functions, which, technically, it did not claim; nor had the requirements of societymade constant legislation so necessary, as that to exclude the peoplefrom the work was to enslave the country. There was popular power enoughto effect much good, but it was widely scattered, and, at the same time, confined in artificial forms. The guilds were vassals of the towns, thetowns, vassals of the feudal lord. The guild voted in the "broad council"of the city as one person; the city voted in the estates as one person. The people of the United Netherlands was the personage yet to beinvented, It was a privilege, not a right, to exercise a handiwork, or toparticipate in the action of government. Yet the mass of privileges wasso large, the shareholders so numerous, that practically the towns wererepublics. The government was in the hands of a large number of thepeople. Industry and intelligence led to wealth and power. This was greatprogress from the general servitude of the 11th and 12th centuries, animmense barrier against arbitrary rule. Loftier ideas of human rights, larger conceptions of commerce, have taught mankind, in later days, thedifference between liberties and liberty, between guilds and freecompetition. At the same time it was the principle of mercantileassociation, in the middle ages, which protected the infant steps ofhuman freedom and human industry against violence and wrong. Moreover, atthis period, the tree of municipal life was still green and vigorous. Thehealthful flow of sap from the humblest roots to the most verdurousbranches indicated the internal soundness of the core, and provided forthe constant development of exterior strength. The road to politicalinfluence was open to all, not by right of birth, but through honorableexertion of heads and hands. 

The chief city of the Netherlands, the commercial capital of the world, was Antwerp. In the North and East of Europe, the Hanseatic league hadwithered with the revolution in commerce. At the South, the splendidmarble channels, through which the overland India trade had beenconducted from the Mediterranean by a few stately cities, were now dry, the great aqueducts ruinous and deserted. Verona, Venice, Nuremberg, Augsburg, Bruges, were sinking, but Antwerp, with its deep and convenientriver, stretched its arm to the ocean and caught the golden prize, as itfell from its sister cities' grasp. The city was so ancient that itsgenealogists, with ridiculous gravity, ascended to a period two centuriesbefore the Trojan war, and discovered a giant, rejoicing in the classicname of Antigonus, established on the Scheld. This patriarch exacted onehalf the merchandise of all navigators who passed his castle, and wasaccustomed to amputate and cast into the river the right hands of thosewho infringed this simple tariff. Thus Hand-werpen, hand-throwing, becameAntwerp, and hence, two hands, in the escutcheon of the city, were everheld up in heraldic attestation of the truth. The giant was, in his turn, thrown into the Scheld by a hero, named Brabo, from whose exploitsBrabant derived its name; "de quo Brabonica tellus. " But for theseantiquarian researches, a simpler derivation of the name would seeman t' werf, "on the wharf. " It had now become the principal entrepot andexchange of Europe. The Huggers, Velsens, Ostetts, of Germany, theGualterotti and Bonvisi of Italy, and many other great mercantile houseswere there established. No city, except Paris, surpassed it inpopulation, none approached it in commercial splendor. Its government wasvery free. The sovereign, as Marquis of Antwerp, was solemnly sworn togovern according to the ancient charters and laws. The stadholder, as hisrepresentative, shared his authority with the four estates of the city. The Senate of eighteen members was appointed by the stadholder out of aquadruple number nominated by the Senate itself and by the fourth body, called the Borgery. Half the board was thus renewed annually. Itexercised executive and appellate judicial functions, appointed twoburgomasters, and two pensionaries or legal councillors, and alsoselected the lesser magistrates and officials of the city. The board ofancients or ex-senators, held their seats ex officio. The twenty-sixward-masters, appointed, two from each ward, by the Senate on nominationby the wards, formed the third estate. Their especial business was toenrol the militia and to attend to its mustering and training. The deansof the guilds, fifty-four in number, two from each guild, selected by theSenate, from a triple list of candidates presented by the guilds, composed the fourth estate. This influential body was always assembled inthe broad-council of the city. Their duty was likewise to conduct theexamination of candidates claiming admittance to any guild and offeringspecimens of art or handiwork, to superintend the general affairs of theguilds and to regulate disputes. 

There were also two important functionaries, representing the king incriminal and civil matters. The Vicarius capitalis, Scultetus, Schout, Sheriff, or Margrave, took precedence of all magistrates. His businesswas to superintend criminal arrests, trials, and executions. The Vicariuscivilis was called the Amman, and his office corresponded with that ofthe Podesta in the Frisian and Italian republics. His duties were nearlysimilar, in civil, to those of his colleague, in criminal matters. 

These four branches, with their functionaries and dependents, composedthe commonwealth of Antwerp. Assembled together in council, theyconstituted the great and general court. No tax could be imposed by thesovereign, except with consent of the four branches, all votingseparately. 

The personal and domiciliary rights of the citizen were scrupulouslyguarded. The Schout could only make arrests with the Burgomaster'swarrant, and was obliged to bring the accused, within three days, beforethe judges, whose courts were open to the public. 

The condition of the population was prosperous. There were but few poor, and those did not seek but were sought by the almoners: The schools wereexcellent and cheap. It was difficult to find a child of sufficient agewho could not read, write, and speak, at least, two languages. The sonsof the wealthier citizens completed their education at Louvain, Douay, Paris, or Padua. 

The city itself was one of the most beautiful in Europe. Placed upon aplain along the banks of the Scheld, shaped like a bent bow with theriver for its string, it enclosed within it walls some of the mostsplendid edifices in Christendom. The world-renowned church of NotreDame, the stately Exchange where five thousand merchants dailycongregated, prototype of all similar establishments throughout theworld, the capacious mole and port where twenty-five hundred vessels wereoften seen at once, and where five hundred made their daily entrance ordeparture, were all establishments which it would have been difficult torival in any other part of the world. 

From what has already been said of the municipal institutions of thecountry, it may be inferred that the powers of the Estates-general werelimited. The members of that congress were not representatives chosen bythe people, but merely a few ambassadors from individual provinces. Thisindividuality was not always composed of the same ingredients. Thus, Holland consisted of two members, or branches--the nobles and the sixchief cities; Flanders of four branches--the cities, namely, of Ghent, Bruges, Ypres, and the "freedom of Bruges;" Brabant of Louvain, Brussels, Bois le Due, and Antwerp, four great cities, without representation ofnobility or clergy; Zeland, of one clerical person, the abbot ofMiddelburg, one noble, the Marquis of Veer and Vliessingen, and six chiefcities; Utrecht, of three branches--the nobility, the clergy, and fivecities. These, and other provinces, constituted in similar manner, weresupposed to be actually present at the diet when assembled. The chiefbusiness of the states-general was financial; the sovereign, or hisstadholder, only obtaining supplies by making a request in person, whileany single city, as branch of a province, had a right to refuse thegrant. 

Education had felt the onward movement of the country and the times. Thewhole system was, however, pervaded by the monastic spirit, which hadoriginally preserved all learning from annihilation, but which now keptit wrapped in the ancient cerecloths, and stiffening in the stonysarcophagus of a bygone age. The university of Louvain was the chiefliterary institution in the provinces. It had been established in 1423 byDuke John IV. Of Brabant. Its government consisted of a President andSenate, forming a close corporation, which had received from the founderall his own authority, and the right to supply their own vacancies. Thefive faculties of law, canon law, medicine, theology, and the arts, werecultivated at the institution. There was, besides, a high school forunder graduates, divided into four classes. The place reeked withpedantry, and the character of the university naturally diffused itselfthrough other scholastic establishments. Nevertheless, it had done andwas doing much to preserve the love for profound learning, while therapidly advancing spirit of commerce was attended by an ever increasingtrain of humanizing arts. 

The standard of culture in those flourishing cities was elevated, compared with that observed in many parts of Europe. The children of thewealthier classes enjoyed great facilities for education in all the greatcapitals. The classics, music, and the modern languages, particularly theFrench, were universally cultivated. Nor was intellectual cultivationconfined to the higher orders. On the contrary, it was diffused to aremarkable degree among the hard-working artisans and handicraftsmen ofthe great cities. 

For the principle of association had not confined itself exclusively topolitics and trade. Besides the numerous guilds by which citizenship wasacquired in the various cities, were many other societies for mutualimprovement, support, or recreation. The great secret, architectural ormasonic brotherhood of Germany, that league to which the artistic andpatient completion of the magnificent works of Gothic architecture in themiddle ages is mainly to be attributed, had its branches in netherGermany, and explains the presence of so many splendid and elaboratelyfinished churches in the provinces. There were also military sodalitiesof musketeers, cross-bowmen, archers, swordsmen in every town. Once ayear these clubs kept holiday, choosing a king, who was selected for hisprowess and skill in the use of various weapons. These festivals, alwaysheld with great solemnity and rejoicing, were accompanied bye manyexhibitions of archery and swordsmanship. The people were not likely, therefore, voluntarily to abandon that privilege and duty of freemen, theright to bear arms, and the power to handle them. 

Another and most important collection of brotherhoods were the so-calledguilds of Rhetoric, which existed, in greater or less number, in all theprincipal cities. These were associations of mechanics, for the purposeof amusing their leisure with poetical effusions, dramatic and musicalexhibitions, theatrical processions, and other harmless and not inelegantrecreations. Such chambers of rhetoric came originally in the fifteenthcentury from France. The fact that in their very title they confoundedrhetoric with poetry and the drama indicates the meagre attainments ofthese early "Rederykers. " In the outset of their career they gavetheatrical exhibitions. "King Herod and his Deeds" was enacted in thecathedral at Utrecht in 1418. The associations spread with great celeritythroughout the Netherlands, and, as they were all connected with eachother, and in habits of periodical intercourse, these humble links ofliterature were of great value in drawing the people of the provincesinto closer union. They became, likewise, important political engines. Asearly as the time of Philip the Good, their songs and lampoons became sooffensive to the arbitrary notions of the Burgundian government, as tocause the societies to be prohibited. It was, however, out of thesovereign's power permanently to suppress institutions, which alreadypartook of the character of the modern periodical press combined withfunctions resembling the show and licence of the Athenian drama. Viewedfrom the stand-point of literary criticism their productions were notvery commendable in taste, conception, or execution. To torture the Musesto madness, to wire-draw poetry through inextricable coils of difficultrhymes and impossible measures; to hammer one golden grain of wit into asheet of infinite platitude, with frightful ingenuity to constructponderous anagrams and preternatural acrostics, to dazzle the vulgar eyewith tawdry costumes, and to tickle the vulgar ear with virulentpersonalities, were tendencies which perhaps smacked of the hammer, theyard-stick and the pincers, and gave sufficient proof, had proof beennecessary, that literature is not one of the mechanical arts, and thatpoetry can not be manufactured to a profit by joint stock companies. Yet, if the style of these lucubrations was often depraved, the artisansrarely received a better example from the literary institutions abovethem. It was not for guilds of mechanics to give the tone to literature, nor were their efforts in more execrable taste than the emanations fromthe pedants of Louvain. The "Rhetoricians" are not responsible for allthe bad taste of their generation. The gravest historians of theNetherlands often relieved their elephantine labors by the most asininegambols, and it was not to be expected that these bustling weavers andcutlers should excel their literary superiors in taste or elegance. 

Philip the Fair enrolled himself as a member in one of these societies. It may easily be inferred, therefore, that they had already become bodiesof recognized importance. The rhetorical chambers existed in the mostobscure villages. The number of yards of Flemish poetry annuallymanufactured and consumed throughout the provinces almost exceed belief. The societies had regular constitutions. Their presiding officers werecalled kings, princes, captains, archdeacons, or rejoiced in similarhigh-sounding names. Each chamber had its treasurer, its buffoon, and itsstandard-bearer for public processions. Each had its peculiar title orblazon, as the Lily, the Marigold, or the Violet, with an appropriatemotto. By the year 1493, the associations had become so important, thatPhilip the Fair summoned them all to a general assembly at Mechlin. Herethey were organized, and formally incorporated under the generalsupervision of an upper or mother-society of Rhetoric, consisting offifteen members, and called by the title of "Jesus with the balsamflower. "

The sovereigns were always anxious to conciliate these influential guildsby becoming members of them in person. Like the players, the Rhetoricianswere the brief abstract and chronicle of the time, and neither prince norprivate person desired their ill report. It had, indeed, been Philip'sintention to convert them into engines for the arbitrary purposes of hishouse, but fortunately the publicly organized societies were not the onlychambers. On the contrary, the unchartered guilds were the moat numerousand influential. They exercised a vast influence upon the progress of thereligious reformation, and the subsequent revolt of the Netherlands. Theyridiculed, with their farces and their satires, the vices of the clergy. They dramatized tyranny for public execration. It was also notsurprising, that among the leaders of the wild anabaptists who disgracedthe great revolution in church and state by their hideous antics, shouldbe found many who, like David of Delft, John of Leyden, and others, hadbeen members of rhetorical chambers. The genius for mummery andtheatrical exhibitions, transplanted from its sphere, and exerting itselffor purposes of fraud and licentiousness, was as baleful in its effectsas it was healthy in its original manifestations. Such exhibitions werebut the excrescences of a system which had borne good fruit. Theseliterary guilds befitted and denoted a people which was alive, a peoplewhich had neither sunk to sleep in the lap of material prosperity, norabased itself in the sty of ignorance and political servitude. The spiritof liberty pervaded these rude but not illiterate assemblies, and herfair proportions were distinctly visible, even through the somewhatgrotesque garb which she thus assumed. 

The great leading recreations which these chambers afforded to themselvesand the public, were the periodic jubilees which they celebrated invarious capital cities. All the guilds of rhetoric throughout theNetherlands were then invited to partake and to compete in magnificentprocessions, brilliant costumes, living pictures, charades, and otheranimated, glittering groups, and in trials of dramatic and poetic skill, all arranged under the superintendence of the particular associationwhich, in the preceding year, had borne away the prize. Such jubileeswere called "Land jewels. "

From the amusements of a people may be gathered much that is necessaryfor a proper estimation of its character. No unfavorable opinion can beformed as to the culture of a nation, whose weavers, smiths, gardeners, and traders, found the favorite amusement of their holidays in composingand enacting tragedies or farces, reciting their own verses, or inpersonifying moral and esthetic sentiments by ingeniously-arrangedgroups, or gorgeous habiliments. The cramoisy velvets and yellow satindoublets of the court, the gold-brocaded mantles of priests and princesare often but vulgar drapery of little historic worth. Such costumesthrown around the swart figures of hard-working artisans, for literaryand artistic purposes, have a real significance, and are worthy of acloser examination. Were not these amusements of the Netherlanders aselevated and humanizing as the contemporary bull-fights and autos-da-feof Spain? What place in history does the gloomy bigot merit who, for thelove of Christ, converted all these gay cities into shambles, and changedthe glittering processions of their Land jewels into fettered marches tothe scaffold?

Thus fifteen ages have passed away, and in the place of a horde ofsavages, living among swamps and thickets, swarm three millions ofpeople, the most industrious, the most prosperous, perhaps the mostintelligent under the sun. Their cattle, grazing on the bottom of thesea, are the finest in Europe, their agricultural products of moreexchangeable value than if nature had made their land to overflow withwine and oil. Their navigators are the boldest, their mercantile marinethe most powerful, their merchants the most enterprising in the world. Holland and Flanders, peopled by one race, vie with each other in thepursuits of civilization. The Flemish skill in the mechanical and in thefine arts is unrivalled. Belgian musicians delight and instruct othernations, Belgian pencils have, for a century, caused the canvas to glowwith colors and combinations never seen before. Flemish fabrics areexported to all parts of Europe, to the East and West Indies, to Africa. The splendid tapestries, silks, linens, as well as the more homely anduseful manufactures of the Netherlands, are prized throughout the world. Most ingenious, as they had already been described by the keen-eyedCaesar, in imitating the arts of other nations, the skillful artificersof the country at Louvain, Ghent, and other places, reproduce the shawlsand silks of India with admirable accuracy. 

Their national industry was untiring; their prosperity unexampled; theirlove of liberty indomitable; their pugnacity proverbial. Peaceful intheir pursuits, phlegmatic by temperament, the Netherlands were yet themost belligerent and excitable population of Europe. Two centuries ofcivil war had but thinned the ranks of each generation without quenchingthe hot spirit of the nation. 

The women were distinguished by beauty of form and vigor of constitution. Accustomed from childhood to converse freely with all classes and sexesin the daily walks of life, and to travel on foot or horseback from onetown to another, without escort and without fear, they had acquiredmanners more frank and independent than those of women in other lands, while their morals were pure and their decorum undoubted. The prominentpart to be sustained by the women of Holland in many dramas of therevolution would thus fitly devolve upon a class, enabled by nature andeducation to conduct themselves with courage. 

Within the little circle which encloses the seventeen provinces are 208walled cities, many of them among the most stately in Christendom, 150chartered towns, 6, 300 villages, with their watch-towers and steeples, besides numerous other more insignificant hamlets; the whole guarded by abelt of sixty fortresses of surpassing strength. 

XIV. 

Thus in this rapid sketch of the course and development of the Netherlandnation during sixteen centuries, we have seen it ever marked by oneprevailing characteristic, one master passion--the love of liberty, theinstinct of self-government. Largely compounded of the bravest Teutonicelements, Batavian and Frisian, the race ever battles to the death withtyranny, organizes extensive revolts in the age of Vespasian, maintains apartial independence even against the sagacious dominion of Charlemagne, refuses in Friesland to accept the papal yoke or feudal chain, and, throughout the dark ages, struggles resolutely towards the light, wresting from a series of petty sovereigns a gradual and practicalrecognition of the claims of humanity. With the advent of the Burgundianfamily, the power of the commons has reached so high a point, that it isable to measure itself, undaunted, with the spirit of arbitrary rule, ofwhich that engrossing and tyrannical house is the embodiment. For morethan a century the struggle for freedom, for civic life, goes on; Philipthe Good, Charles the Bold, Mary's husband Maximilian, Charles V. , inturn, assailing or undermining the bulwarks raised, age after age, against the despotic principle. The combat is ever renewed. Liberty, often crushed, rises again and again from her native earth with redoubledenergy. At last, in the 16th century, a new and more powerful spirit, thegenius of religious freedom, comes to participate in the great conflict. Arbitrary power, incarnated in the second Charlemagne, assails the newcombination with unscrupulous, unforgiving fierceness. Venerable civicmagistrates; haltered, grovel in sackcloth and ashes; innocent, religiousreformers burn in holocausts. By the middle of the century, the battlerages more fiercely than ever. In the little Netherland territory, Humanity, bleeding but not killed, still stands at bay and defies thehunters. The two great powers have been gathering strength for centuries. They are soon to be matched in a longer and more determined combat thanthe world had ever seen. The emperor is about to leave the stage. Theprovinces, so passionate for nationality, for municipal freedom, forreligious reformation, are to become the property of an utter stranger; aprince foreign to their blood, their tongue, their religion, their wholehabits of life and thought. 

Such was the political, religious, and social condition of a nation whowere now to witness a new and momentous spectacle. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Absolution for incest was afforded at thirty-six livres Achieved the greatness to which they had not been born Advancing age diminished his tendency to other carnal pleasures All his disciples and converts are to be punished with death All reading of the scriptures (forbidden) Altercation between Luther and Erasmus, upon predestination An hereditary papacy, a perpetual pope-emperor Announced his approaching marriage with the Virgin Mary As ready as papists, with age, fagot, and excommunication Attacking the authority of the pope Bold reformer had only a new dogma in place of the old ones Charles the Fifth autocrat of half the world Condemning all heretics to death Craft meaning, simply, strength Criminal whose guilt had been established by the hot iron Criminals buying Paradise for money Crusades made great improvement in the condition of the serfs Democratic instincts of the ancient German savages Denies the utility of prayers for the dead Difference between liberties and liberty Dispute between Luther and Zwingli concerning the real presence Divine right Drank of the water in which, he had washed Enormous wealth (of the Church) which engendered the hatred Erasmus encourages the bold friar Erasmus of Rotterdam Even for the rape of God's mother, if that were possible Executions of Huss and Jerome of Prague Fable of divine right is invented to sanction the system Felix Mants, the anabaptist, is drowned at Zurich Few, even prelates were very dutiful to the pope Fiction of apostolic authority to bind and loose Fishermen and river raftsmen become ocean adventurers For myself I am unworthy of the honor (of martyrdom) Forbids all private assemblies for devotion Force clerical--the power of clerks Great Privilege, the Magna Charta of Holland Guarantees of forgiveness for every imaginable sin Halcyon days of ban, book and candle Heresy was a plant of early growth in the Netherlands In Holland, the clergy had neither influence nor seats Invented such Christian formulas as these (a curse) July 1st, two Augustine monks were burned at Brussels King of Zion to be pinched to death with red-hot tongs Labored under the disadvantage of never having existed Learn to tremble as little at priestcraft as at swordcraft Many greedy priests, of lower rank, had turned shop-keepers No one can testify but a householder Not of the stuff of which martyrs are made (Erasmus) Nowhere was the persecution of heretics more relentless Obstinate, of both sexes, to be burned One golden grain of wit into a sheet of infinite platitude Pardon for crimes already committed, or about to be committed Pardon for murder, if not by poison, was cheaper Paying their passage through, purgatory Poisoning, for example, was absolved for eleven ducats Pope and emperor maintain both positions with equal logic Power to read and write helped the clergy to much wealth Readiness to strike and bleed at any moment in her cause Repentant females to be buried alive Repentant males to be executed with the sword Sale of absolutions was the source of large fortunes to the priests Same conjury over ignorant baron and cowardly hind Scoffing at the ceremonies and sacraments of the Church Sharpened the punishment for reading the scriptures in private Slavery was both voluntary and compulsory Soldier of the cross was free upon his return St. Peter's dome rising a little nearer to the clouds Tanchelyn The bad Duke of Burgundy, Philip surnamed "the Good, " The egg had been laid by Erasmus, hatched by Luther The vivifying becomes afterwards the dissolving principle Thousands of burned heretics had not made a single convert Thus Hand-werpen, hand-throwing, became Antwerp To prefer poverty to the wealth attendant upon trade Tranquillity of despotism to the turbulence of freedom Villagers, or villeins

*****

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 3. 

PHILIP THE SECOND IN THE NETHERLANDS

CHAPTER I. 1555

 Abdication of Charles resolved upon--Brussels in the sixteenth century--Hall of the palace described--Portraits of prominent individuals present at the ceremony--Formalities of the abdication-- Universal emotion--Remarks upon the character and career of Charles --His retirement at Juste. 

On the twenty-fifth day of October, 1555, the estates of the Netherlandswere assembled in the great hall of the palace at Brussels. They had beensummoned to be the witnesses and the guarantees of the abdication whichCharles V. Had long before resolved upon, and which he was that day toexecute. The emperor, like many potentates before and since, was fond ofgreat political spectacles. He knew their influence upon the masses ofmankind. Although plain, even to shabbiness, in his own costume, andusually attired in black, no one ever understood better than he how toarrange such exhibitions in a striking and artistic style. We have seenthe theatrical and imposing manner in which he quelled the insurrectionat Ghent, and nearly crushed the life forever out of that vigorous andturbulent little commonwealth. The closing scene of his long andenergetic reign he had now arranged with profound study, and with anaccurate knowledge of the manner in which the requisite effects were tobe produced. The termination of his own career, the opening of hisbeloved Philip's, were to be dramatized in a manner worthy the augustcharacter of the actors, and the importance of the great stage where theyplayed their parts. The eyes of the whole world were directed upon thatday towards Brussels; for an imperial abdication was an event which hadnot, in the sixteenth century, been staled by custom. 

The gay capital of Brabant--of that province which rejoiced in theliberal constitution known by the cheerful title of the "joyfulentrance, " was worthy to be the scene of the imposing show. Brussels hadbeen a city for more than five centuries, and, at that day, numberedabout one hundred thousand inhabitants. Its walls, six miles incircumference, were already two hundred years old. Unlike most Netherlandcities, lying usually upon extensive plains, it was built along the sidesof an abrupt promontory. A wide expanse of living verdure, cultivatedgardens, shady groves, fertile cornfields, flowed round it like a sea. The foot of the town was washed by the little river Senne, while theirregular but picturesque streets rose up the steep sides of the hilllike the semicircles and stairways of an amphitheatre. Nearly in theheart of the place rose the audacious and exquisitely embroidered towerof the townhouse, three hundred and sixty-six feet in height, a miracleof needlework in stone, rivalling in its intricate carving the cobwebtracery of that lace which has for centuries been synonymous with thecity, and rearing itself above a facade of profusely decorated andbrocaded architecture. The crest of the elevation was crowned by thetowers of the old ducal palace of Brabant, with its extensive andthickly-wooded park on the left, and by the stately mansions of Orange, Egmont, Aremberg, Culemburg, and other Flemish grandees, on the right. . The great forest of Soignies, dotted with monasteries and convents, swarming with every variety of game, whither the citizens made theirsummer pilgrimages, and where the nobles chased the wild boar and thestag, extended to within a quarter of a mile of the city walls. Thepopulation, as thrifty, as intelligent, as prosperous as that of any cityin Europe, was divided into fifty-two guilds of artisans, among which themost important were the armorers, whose suits of mail would turn amusket-ball; the gardeners, upon whose gentler creations incredible sumswere annually lavished; and the tapestry-workers, whose gorgeous fabricswere the wonder of the world. Seven principal churches, of which the moststriking was that of St. Gudule, with its twin towers, its charmingfacade, and its magnificently painted windows, adorned the upper part ofthe city. The number seven was a magic number in Brussels, and wassupposed at that epoch, during which astronomy was in its infancy andastrology in its prime, to denote the seven planets which governed allthings terrestrial by their aspects and influences. Seven noble families, springing from seven ancient castles, supplied the stock from which theseven senators were selected who composed the upper council of the city. There were seven great squares, seven city gates, and upon the occasionof the present ceremony, it was observed by the lovers of wonderfulcoincidences, that seven crowned heads would be congregated under asingle roof in the liberty-loving city. 

The palace where the states-general were upon this occasion convened, hadbeen the residence of the Dukes of Brabant since the days of John theSecond, who had built it about the year 1300. It was a spacious andconvenient building, but not distinguished for the beauty of itsarchitecture. In front was a large open square, enclosed by an ironrailing; in the rear an extensive and beautiful park, filled with foresttrees, and containing gardens and labyrinths, fish-ponds and gamepreserves, fountains and promenades, race-courses and archery grounds. The main entrance to this edifice opened upon a spacious hall, connectedwith a beautiful and symmetrical chapel. The hall was celebrated for itssize, harmonious proportions, and the richness of its decorations. It wasthe place where the chapters of the famous order of the Golden Fleecewere held. Its walls were hung with a magnificent tapestry of Arran, representing the life and achievements of Gideon, the Midianite, andgiving particular prominence to the miracle of the "fleece of wool, "vouchsafed to that renowned champion, the great patron of the Knights ofthe Fleece. On the present occasion there were various additionalembellishments of flowers and votive garlands. At the western end aspacious platform or stage, with six or seven steps, had beenconstructed, below which was a range of benches for the deputies of theseventeen provinces. Upon the stage itself there were rows of seats, covered with tapestry, upon the right hand and upon the left. These wererespectively to accommodate the knights of the order and the guests ofhigh distinction. In the rear of these were other benches, for themembers of the three great councils. In the centre of the stage was asplendid canopy, decorated with the arms of Burgundy, beneath which wereplaced three gilded arm-chairs. 

All the seats upon the platform were vacant, but the benches below, assigned to the deputies of the provinces, were already filled. Numerousrepresentatives from all the states but two--Gelderland andOveryssel--had already taken their places. Grave magistrates, in chainand gown, and executive officers in the splendid civic uniforms for whichthe Netherlands were celebrated, already filled every seat within theapace allotted. The remainder of the hall was crowded with the morefavored portion of the multitude which had been fortunate enough toprocure admission to the exhibition. The archers and hallebardiers of thebody-guard kept watch at all the doors. The theatre was filled--theaudience was eager with expectation--the actors were yet to arrive. Asthe clock struck three, the hero of the scene appeared. Caesar, as he wasalways designated in the classic language of the day, entered, leaning onthe shoulder of William of Orange. They came from the chapel, and wereimmediately followed by Philip the Second and Queen Mary of Hungary. TheArchduke Maximilian the Duke of Savoy, and other great personages cameafterwards, accompanied by a glittering throng of warriors, councillors, governors, and Knights of the Fleece. 

Many individuals of existing or future historic celebrity in theNetherlands, whose names are so familiar to the student of the epoch, seemed to have been grouped, as if by premeditated design, upon thisimposing platform, where the curtain was to fall forever upon themightiest emperor since Charlemagne, and where the opening scene of thelong and tremendous tragedy of Philip's reign was to be simultaneouslyenacted. There was the Bishop of Arras, soon to be known throughoutChristendom by the more celebrated title of Cardinal Granvelle, theserene and smiling priest whose subtle influence over the destinies of somany individuals then present, and over the fortunes of the whole land, was to be so extensive and so deadly. There was that flower of Flemishchivalry, the lineal descendant of ancient Frisian kings, alreadydistinguished for his bravery in many fields, but not having yet wonthose two remarkable victories which were soon to make the name of Egmontlike the sound of a trumpet throughout the whole country. Tall, magnificent in costume, with dark flowing hair, soft brown eye, smoothcheek, a slight moustache, and features of almost feminine delicacy; suchwas the gallant and ill-fated Lamoral Egmont. The Count of Horn; too, with bold, sullen face, and fan-shaped beard-a brave, honest, discontented, quarrelsome, unpopular man; those other twins in doom--theMarquis Berghen and the Lord of Montigny; the Baron Berlaymont, brave, intensely loyal, insatiably greedy for office and wages, but who, atleast, never served but one party; the Duke of Arschot, who was to serveall, essay to rule all, and to betray all--a splendid seignor, magnificent in cramoisy velvet, but a poor creature, who traced hispedigree from Adam, according to the family monumental inscriptions atLouvain, but who was better known as grand-nephew of the emperor's famoustutor, Chiebres; the bold, debauched Brederode, with handsome, recklessface and turbulent demeanor; the infamous Noircarmes, whose name was tobe covered with eternal execration, for aping towards his own compatriotsand kindred as much of Alva's atrocities and avarice, as he was permittedto exercise; the distinguished soldiers Meghen and Aremberg--these, withmany others whose deeds of arms were to become celebrated throughoutEurope, were all conspicuous in the brilliant crowd. There, too, was thatlearned Frisian, President Viglius, crafty, plausible, adroit, eloquent--a small, brisk man, with long yellow hair, glittering greeneyes, round, tumid, rosy cheeks, and flowing beard. Foremost among theSpanish grandees, and close to Philip, stood the famous favorite, RuyGomez, or as he was familiarly called "Re y Gomez" (King and Gomez), aman of meridional aspect, with coal-black hair and beard, gleaming eyes, a face pallid with intense application, and slender but handsome figure;while in immediate attendance upon the emperor, was the immortal Princeof Orange. 

Such were a few only of the most prominent in that gay throng, whosefortunes, in part, it will be our humble duty to narrate; how many ofthem passing through all this glitter to a dark and mysteriousdoom!--some to perish on public scaffolds, some by midnightassassination; others, more fortunate, to fall on the battle-field--nearly all, sooner or later, to be laid in bloody graves!

All the company present had risen to their feet as the emperor entered. By his command, all immediately afterwards resumed their places. Thebenches at either end of the platform were accordingly filled with theroyal and princely personages invited, with the Fleece Knights, wearingthe insignia of their order, with the members of the three greatcouncils, and with the governors. The Emperor, the King, and the Queen ofHungary, were left conspicuous in the centre of the scene. As the wholeobject of the ceremony was to present an impressive exhibition, it isworth our while to examine minutely the appearance of the two principalcharacters. 

Charles the Fifth was then fifty-five years and eight months old; but hewas already decrepit with premature old age. He was of about the middleheight, and had been athletic and well-proportioned. Broad in theshoulders, deep in the chest, thin in the flank, very muscular in thearms and legs, he had been able to match himself with all competitors inthe tourney and the ring, and to vanquish the bull with his own hand inthe favorite national amusement of Spain. He had been able in the fieldto do the duty of captain and soldier, to endure fatigue and exposure, and every privation except fasting. These personal advantages were nowdeparted. Crippled in hands, knees and legs, he supported himself withdifficulty upon a crutch, with the aid of, an attendant's shoulder. Inface he had always been extremely ugly, and time had certainly notimproved his physiognomy. His hair, once of a light color, was now whitewith age, close-clipped and bristling; his beard was grey, coarse, andshaggy. His forehead was spacious and commanding; the eye was dark blue, with an expression both majestic and benignant. His nose was aquiline butcrooked. The lower part of his face was famous for its deformity. Theunder lip, a Burgundian inheritance, as faithfully transmitted as theduchy and county, was heavy and hanging; the lower jaw protruding so farbeyond the upper, that it was impossible for him to bring together thefew fragments of teeth which still remained, or to speak a whole sentencein an intelligible voice. Eating and talking, occupations to which he wasalways much addicted, were becoming daily more arduous, in consequence ofthis original defect, which now seemed hardly human, but rather anoriginal deformity. 

So much for the father. The son, Philip the Second, was a small, meagreman, much below the middle height, with thin legs, a narrow chest, andthe shrinking, timid air of an habitual invalid. He seemed so little, upon his first visit to his aunts, the Queens Eleanor and Mary, accustomed to look upon proper men in Flanders and Germany, that he wasfain to win their favor by making certain attempts in the tournament, inwhich his success was sufficiently problematical. "His body, " says hisprofessed panegyrist, "was but a human cage, in which, however brief andnarrow, dwelt a soul to whose flight the immeasurable expanse of heavenwas too contracted. " [Cabrera] The same wholesale admirer adds, that "hisaspect was so reverend, that rustics who met him alone in a wood, withoutknowing him, bowed down with instinctive veneration. " In face, he was theliving image of his father, having the same broad forehead, and blue eye, with the same aquiline, but better proportioned, nose. In the lower partof the countenance, the remarkable Burgundian deformity was likewisereproduced. He had the same heavy, hanging lip, with a vast mouth, andmonstrously protruding lower jaw. His complexion was fair, his hair lightand thin, his beard yellow, short, and pointed. He had the aspect of aFleming, but the loftiness of a Spaniard. His demeanor in public wasstill, silent, almost sepulchral. He looked habitually on the ground whenhe conversed, was chary of speech, embarrassed, and even suffering inmanner. This was ascribed partly to a natural haughtiness which he hadoccasionally endeavored to overcome, and partly to habitual pains in thestomach, occasioned by his inordinate fondness for pastry. [Bodavaro]

Such was the personal appearance of the man who was about to receive intohis single hand the destinies of half the world; whose single will was, for the future, to shape the fortunes of every individual then present, of many millions more in Europe, America, and at the ends of the earth, and of countless millions yet unborn. 

The three royal personages being seated upon chairs placed triangularlyunder the canopy, such of the audience as had seats provided for them, now took their places, and the proceedings commenced. Philibert deBruxelles, a member of the privy council of the Netherlands, arose at theemperor's command, and made a long oration. He spoke of the emperor'swarm affection for the provinces, as the land of his birth; of his deepregret that his broken health and failing powers, both of body and mind, compelled him to resign his sovereignty, and to seek relief for hisshattered frame in a more genial climate. Caesar's gout was then depictedin energetic language, which must have cost him a twinge as he sat thereand listened to the councillor's eloquence. "'Tis a most truculentexecutioner, " said Philibert: "it invades the whole body, from the crownof the head to the soles of the feet, leaving nothing untouched. Itcontracts the nerves with intolerable anguish, it enters the bones, itfreezes the marrow, it converts the lubricating fluids of the joints intochalk, it pauses not until, having exhausted and debilitated the wholebody, it has rendered all its necessary instruments useless, andconquered the mind by immense torture. " [Godelaevus]

 [The historian was present at the ceremony, and gives a very full report of the speeches, all of which he heard. His imagination may have assisted his memory in the task. The other reporters of the councillor's harangue have reduced this pathological flight of rhetoric to a very small compass. ]

Engaged in mortal struggle with such an enemy, Caesar felt himselfobliged, as the councillor proceeded to inform his audience, to changethe scene of the contest from the humid air of Flanders to the warmeratmosphere of Spain. He rejoiced, however, that his son was both vigorousand experienced, and that his recent marriage with the Queen of Englandhad furnished the provinces with a most valuable alliance. He then againreferred to the emperor's boundless love for his subjects, and concludedwith a tremendous, but superfluous, exhortation to Philip on thenecessity of maintaining the Catholic religion in its purity. After thislong harangue, which has been fully reported by several historians whowere present at the ceremony, the councillor proceeded to read the deedof cession, by which Philip, already sovereign of Sicily, Naples, Milan, and titular King of England, France, and Jerusalem, now received all theduchies, marquisates, earldoms, baronies, cities, towns, and castles ofthe Burgundian property, including, of course, the seventeen Netherlands. 

As De Bruxelles finished, there was a buzz of admiration throughout theassembly, mingled with murmurs of regret, that in the present greatdanger upon the frontiers from the belligerent King of France and hiswarlike and restless nation, the provinces should be left without theirancient and puissant defender. The emperor then rose to his feet. Leaningon his crutch, he beckoned from his seat the personage upon whose arm hehad leaned as he entered the hall. A tall, handsome youth of twenty-twocame forward--a man whose name from that time forward, and as long ashistory shall endure, has been, and will be, more familiar than any otherin the mouths of Netherlanders. At that day he had rather a southern thana German or Flemish appearance. He had a Spanish cast of features, dark, well chiselled, and symmetrical. His head was small and well placed uponhis shoulders. His hair was dark brown, as were also his moustache andpeaked beard. His forehead was lofty, spacious, and already prematurelyengraved with the anxious lines of thought. His eyes were full, brown, well opened, and expressive of profound reflection. He was dressed in themagnificent apparel for which the Netherlanders were celebrated above allother nations, and which the ceremony rendered necessary. His presencebeing considered indispensable at this great ceremony, he had beensummoned but recently from the camp on the frontier, where, notwithstanding his youth, the emperor had appointed him to command hisarmy in chief against such antagonists as Admiral Coligny and the Due deNevers. 

Thus supported upon his crutch and upon the shoulder of William ofOrange, the Emperor proceeded to address the states, by the aid of aclosely-written brief which he held in his hand. He reviewed rapidly theprogress of events from his seventeenth year up to that day. He spoke ofhis nine expeditions into Germany, six to Spain, seven to Italy, four toFrance, ten to the Netherlands, two to England, as many to Africa, and ofhis eleven voyages by sea. He sketched his various wars, victories, andtreaties of peace, assuring his hearers that the welfare of his subjectsand the security of the Roman Catholic religion had ever been the leadingobjects of his life. As long as God had granted him health, he continued, only enemies could have regretted that Charles was living and reigning, but now that his strength was but vanity, and life fast ebbing away, hislove for dominion, his affection for his subjects, and his regard fortheir interests, required his departure. Instead of a decrepit man withone foot in the grave, he presented them with a sovereign in the prime oflife and the vigor of health. Turning toward Philip, he observed, thatfor a dying father to bequeath so magnificent an empire to his son was adeed worthy of gratitude, but that when the father thus descended to thegrave before his time, and by an anticipated and living burial sought toprovide for the welfare of his realms and the grandeur of his son, thebenefit thus conferred was surely far greater. He added, that the debtwould be paid to him and with usury, should Philip conduct himself in hisadministration of the province with a wise and affectionate regard totheir true interests. Posterity would applaud his abdication, should hisson Prove worthy of his bounty; and that could only be by living in thefear of God, and by maintaining law, justice, and the Catholic religionin all their purity, as the true foundation of the realm. In conclusion, he entreated the estates, and through them the nation, to renderobedience to their new prince, to maintain concord and to preserveinviolate the Catholic faith; begging them, at the same time, to pardonhim all errors or offences which he might have committed towards themduring his reign, and assuring them that he should unceasingly remembertheir obedience and affection in his every prayer to that Being to whomthe remainder of his life was to be dedicated. 

Such brave words as these, so many vigorous asseverations of attemptedperformance of duty, such fervent hopes expressed of a benignadministration in behalf of the son, could not but affect thesensibilities of the audience, already excited and softened by theimpressive character of the whole display. Sobs were heard throughoutevery portion of the hall, and tears poured profusely from every eye. TheFleece Knights on the platform and the burghers in the background wereall melted with the same emotion. As for the Emperor himself, he sankalmost fainting upon his chair as he concluded his address. An ashypaleness overspread his countenance, and he wept like a child. Even theicy Philip was almost softened, as he rose to perform his part in theceremony. Dropping upon his knees before his father's feet, he reverentlykissed his hand. Charles placed his hands solemnly upon his son's head, made the sign of the cross, and blessed him in the name of the HolyTrinity. Then raising him in his arms he tenderly embraced him saying, as he did so, to the great potentates around him, that he felt a sincerecompassion for the son on whose shoulders so heavy a weight had justdevolved, and which only a life-long labor would enable him to support. Philip now uttered a few words expressive of his duty to his father andhis affection for his people. Turning to the orders, he signified hisregret that he was unable to address them either in the French or Flemishlanguage, and was therefore obliged to ask their attention to the Bishopof Arras, who would act as his interpreter. Antony Perrenot accordinglyarose, and in smooth, fluent, and well-turned commonplaces, expressed atgreat length the gratitude of Philip towards his father, with his firmdetermination to walk in the path of duty, and to obey his father'scounsels and example in the future administration of the provinces. Thislong address of the prelate was responded to at equal length by JacobMaas, member of the Council of Brabant, a man of great learning, eloquence and prolixity, who had been selected to reply on behalf of thestates-general, and who now, in the name of these; bodies, accepted theabdication in an elegant and complimentary harangue. Queen Mary ofHungary, the "Christian widow" of Erasmus, and Regent of the Netherlandsduring the past twenty-five years, then rose to resign her office, makinga brief address expressive of her affection for the people, her regretsat leaving them, and her hopes that all errors which she might havecommitted during her long administration would be forgiven her. Again theredundant Maas responded, asserting in terms of fresh compliment andelegance the uniform satisfaction of the provinces with her conductduring her whole career. 

The orations and replies having now been brought to a close, the ceremonywas terminated. The Emperor, leaning on the shoulders of the Prince ofOrange and of the Count de Buren, slowly left the hall, followed byPhilip, the Queen of Hungary, and the whole court; all in the same orderin which they had entered, and by the same passage into the chapel. 

It is obvious that the drama had been completely successful. It had beena scene where heroic self-sacrifice, touching confidence, ingenuous loveof duty, patriotism, and paternal affection upon one side; filialreverence, with a solemn regard for public duty and the highest interestsof the people on the other, were supposed to be the predominantsentiments. The happiness of the Netherlands was apparently the onlyobject contemplated in the great transaction. All had played well theirparts in the past, all hoped the best in the times which were to follow. The abdicating Emperor was looked upon as a hero and a prophet. The stagewas drowned in tears. There is not the least doubt as to the genuine anduniversal emotion which was excited throughout the assembly. "Caesar'soration, " says Secretary Godelaevus, who was present at the ceremony, "deeply moved the nobility and gentry, many of whom burst into tears;even the illustrious Knights of the Fleece were melted. " The historian, Pontus Heuterus, who, then twenty years of age, was likewise among theaudience, attests that "most of the assembly were dissolved in tears;uttering the while such sonorous sobs that they compelled his CaesareanMajesty and the Queen to cry with them. My own face, " he adds, "wascertainly quite wet. " The English envoy, Sir John Mason, describing in adespatch to his government the scene which he had just witnessed, paintsthe same picture. "The Emperor, " he said, "begged the forgiveness of hissubjects if he had ever unwittingly omitted the performance of any of hisduties towards them. And here, " continues the envoy, "he broke into aweeping, whereunto, besides the dolefulness of the matter, I think, hewas moche provoked by seeing the whole company to do the lyke before;there beyng in myne opinion not one man in the whole assemblie, strangeror another, that dewring the time of a good piece of his oration pourednot out as abundantly teares, some more, some lesse. And yet he prayedthem to beare with his imperfections, proceeding of his sickly age, andof the mentioning of so tender a matter as the departing from such a sortof dere and loving subjects. "

And yet what was the Emperor Charles to the inhabitants of theNetherlands that they should weep for him? His conduct towards themduring his whole career had been one of unmitigated oppression. What tothem were all these forty voyages by sea and land, these journeyings backand forth from Friesland to Tunis, from Madrid to Vienna. What was it tothem that the imperial shuttle was thus industriously flying to and fro?The fabric wrought was but the daily growing grandeur and splendor of hisimperial house; the looms were kept moving at the expense of theirhardly-earned treasure, and the woof was often dyed red in the blood ofhis bravest subjects. The interests of the Netherlands had never beeneven a secondary consideration with their master. He had fulfilled noduty towards them, he had committed the gravest crimes against them. Hehad regarded them merely as a treasury upon which to draw; while the sumswhich he extorted were spent upon ceaseless and senseless wars, whichwere of no more interest to them than if they had been waged in anotherplanet. Of five millions of gold annually, which he derived from all hisrealms, two millions came from these industrious and opulent provinces, while but a half million came from Spain and another half from theIndies. The mines of wealth which had been opened by the hand of industryin that slender territory of ancient morass and thicket, contributed fourtimes as much income to the imperial exchequer as all the boasted wealthof Mexico and Peru. Yet the artisans, the farmers and the merchants, bywhom these riches were produced, were consulted about as much in theexpenditure of the imposts upon their industry as were the savages ofAmerica as to the distribution of the mineral treasures of their soil. The rivalry of the houses of Habsburg and Valois, this was the absorbingtheme, during the greater part of the reign which had just been sodramatically terminated. To gain the empire over Francis, to leave to DonPhilip a richer heritage than the Dauphin could expect, were the greatmotives of the unparalleled energy displayed by Charles during the longerand the more successful portion of his career. To crush the Reformationthroughout his dominions, was his occupation afterward, till he abandonedthe field in despair. It was certainly not desirable for theNetherlanders that they should be thus controlled by a man who forcedthem to contribute so largely to the success of schemes, some of whichwere at best indifferent, and others entirely odious to them. They paid1, 200, 000 crowns a year regularly; they paid in five years anextraordinary subsidy of eight millions of ducats, and the States wereroundly rebuked by the courtly representatives of their despot, if theypresumed to inquire into the objects of the appropriations, or to expressan interest in their judicious administration. Yet it maybe supposed tohave been a matter of indifference to them whether Francis or Charles hadwon the day at Pavia, and it certainly was not a cause of triumph to thedaily increasing thousands of religious reformers in Holland and Flandersthat their brethren had been crushed by the Emperor at Muhlberg. But itwas not alone that he drained their treasure, and hampered theirindustry. He was in constant conflict with their ancient anddearly-bought political liberties. Like his ancestor Charles the Bold, hewas desirous of constructing a kingdom out of the provinces. He wasdisposed to place all their separate and individual charters on aprocrustean bed, and shape them all into uniformity simply by reducingthe whole to a nullity. The difficulties in the way, the stout oppositionoffered by burghers, whose fathers had gained these charters with theirblood, and his want of leisure during the vast labors which devolved uponhim as the autocrat of so large a portion of the world, caused him todefer indefinitely the execution of his plan. He found time only to crushsome of the foremost of the liberal institutions of the provinces, indetail. He found the city of Tournay a happy, thriving, self-governedlittle republic in all its local affairs; he destroyed its liberties, without a tolerable pretext, and reduced it to the condition of a Spanishor Italian provincial town. 

His memorable chastisement of Ghent for having dared to assert itsancient rights of self-taxation, is sufficiently known to the world, andhas been already narrated at length. Many other instances might beadduced, if it were not a superfluous task, to prove that Charles was notonly a political despot, but most arbitrary and cruel in the exercise ofhis despotism. 

But if his sins against the Netherlands had been only those of financialand political oppression, it would be at least conceivable, althoughcertainly not commendable, that the inhabitants should have regretted hisdeparture. But there are far darker crimes for which he stands arraignedat the bar of history, and it is indeed strange that the man who hadcommitted them should have been permitted to speak his farewell amidblended plaudits and tears. His hand planted the inquisition in theNetherlands. Before his day it is idle to say that the diabolicalinstitution ever had a place there. The isolated cases in whichinquisitors had exercised functions proved the absence and not thepresence of the system, and will be discussed in a later chapter. Charlesintroduced and organized a papal inquisition, side by side with thoseterrible "placards" of his invention, which constituted a maskedinquisition even more cruel than that of Spain. The execution of thesystem was never permitted to languish. The number of Netherlanders whowere burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive, in obedience to hisedicts, and for the offences of reading the Scriptures, of lookingaskance at a graven image, or of ridiculing the actual presence of thebody and blood of Christ in a wafer, have been placed as high as onehundred thousand by distinguished authorities, and have never been put ata lower mark than fifty thousand. The Venetian envoy Navigero placed thenumber of victims in the provinces of Holland and Friesland alone atthirty thousand, and this in 1546, ten years before the abdication, andfive before the promulgation of the hideous edict of 1550!

The edicts and the inquisition were the gift of Charles to theNetherlands, in return for their wasted treasure and their constantobedience. For this, his name deserves to be handed down to eternalinfamy, not only throughout the Netherlands, but in every land where asingle heart beats for political or religious freedom. To eradicate theseinstitutions after they had been watered and watched by the care of hissuccessor, was the work of an eighty years' war, in the course of whichmillions of lives were sacrificed. Yet the abdicating Emperor hadsummoned his faithful estates around him, and stood up before them in hisimperial robes for the last time, to tell them of the affectionate regardwhich he had always borne them, and to mingle his tears with theirs. 

Could a single phantom have risen from one of the many thousand graveswhere human beings had been thrust alive by his decree, perhaps theremight have been an answer to the question propounded by the Emperor amidall that piteous weeping. Perhaps it might have told the man who askedhis hearers to be forgiven if he had ever unwittingly offended them, thatthere was a world where it was deemed an offence to torture, strangle, burn, and drown one's innocent fellow-creatures. The usual but triflingexcuse for such enormities can not be pleaded for the Emperor. Charleswas no fanatic. The man whose armies sacked Rome, who laid hissacrilegious hands on Christ's vicegerent, and kept the infallible headof the Church a prisoner to serve his own political ends, was then nobigot. He believed in nothing; save that when the course of his imperialwill was impeded, and the interests of his imperial house in jeopardy, pontiffs were to succumb as well as anabaptists. It was the politicalheresy which lurked in the restiveness of the religious reformers underdogma, tradition, and supernatural sanction to temporal power, which hewas disposed to combat to the death. He was too shrewd a politician notto recognize the connection between aspirations for religious and forpolitical freedom. His hand was ever ready to crush both heresies in one. Had he been a true son of the Church, a faithful champion of herinfallibility, he would not have submitted to the peace of Passau, solong as he could bring a soldier to the field. Yet he acquiesced in theReformation for Germany, while the fires for burning the reformers wereever blazing in the Netherlands, where it was death even to allude to theexistence of the peace of Passau. Nor did he acquiesce only fromcompulsion, for long before his memorable defeat by Maurice, he hadpermitted the German troops, with whose services he could not dispense, regularly to attend Protestant worship performed by their own Protestantchaplains. Lutheran preachers marched from city to city of theNetherlands under the imperial banner, while the subjects of thosepatrimonial provinces were daily suffering on the scaffold for theirnonconformity. The influence of this garrison-preaching upon the progressof the Reformation in the Netherlands is well known. Charles hatedLutherans, but he required soldiers, and he thus helped by his own policyto disseminate what had he been the fanatic which he perhaps became inretirement, he would have sacrificed his life to crush. It is quite truethat the growing Calvinism of the provinces was more dangerous bothreligiously and politically, than the Protestantism of the Germanprinces, which had not yet been formally pronounced heresy, but it isthus the more evident that it was political rather than religiousheterodoxy which the despot wished to suppress. 

No man, however, could have been more observant of religious rites. Heheard mass daily. He listened to a sermon every Sunday and holiday. Heconfessed and received the sacrament four times a year. He was sometimesto be seen in his tent at midnight, on his knees before a crucifix witheyes and hands uplifted. He ate no meat in Lent, and used extraordinarydiligence to discover and to punish any man, whether courtier orplebeian, who failed to fast during the whole forty days. He was too gooda politician not to know the value of broad phylacteries and longprayers. He was too nice an observer of human nature not to know howeasily mint and cummin could still outweigh the "weightier matters oflaw, judgment, mercy and faith;" as if the founder of the religion whichhe professed, and to maintain which he had established the inquisitionand the edicts, had never cried woe upon the Pharisees. Yet there is nodoubt that the Emperor was at times almost popular in the Netherlands, and that he was never as odious as his successor. There were some deepreasons for this, and some superficial ones; among others, a singularlyfortunate manner. He spoke German, Spanish, Italian, French, and Flemish, and could assume the characteristics of each country as easily as hecould use its language. He could be stately with Spaniards, familiar withFlemings witty with Italians. He could strike down a bull in the ringlike a matador at Madrid, or win the prize in the tourney like a knightof old; he could ride at the ring with the Flemish nobles, hit thepopinjay with his crossbow among Antwerp artisans, or drink beer andexchange rude jests with the boors of Brabant. For virtues such as these, his grave crimes against God and man, against religion and chartered andsolemnly-sworn rights have been palliated, as if oppression became moretolerable because the oppressor was an accomplished linguist and a goodmarksman. 

But the great reason for his popularity no doubt lay in his militarygenius. Charles was inferior to no general of his age. "When he was borninto the world, " said Alva, "he was born a soldier, " and the Emperorconfirmed the statement and reciprocated the compliment, when he declaredthat "the three first captains of the age were himself first, and thenthe Duke of Alva and Constable Montmorency. " It is quite true that allhis officers were not of the same opinion, and many were too apt tocomplain that his constant presence in the field did more harm than good, and "that his Majesty would do much better to stay at home. " There is, however, no doubt that he was both a good soldier and a good general. Hewas constitutionally fearless, and he possessed great energy andendurance. He was ever the first to arm when a battle was to be fought, and the last to take off his harness. He commanded in person and inchief, even when surrounded by veterans and crippled by the gout. He wascalm in great reverses. It was said that he was never known to changecolor except upon two occasions: after the fatal destruction of his fleetat Algiers, and in the memorable flight from Innspruck. He was of aphlegmatic, stoical temperament, until shattered by age and disease; aman without a sentiment and without a tear. It was said by Spaniards thathe was never seen to weep, even at the death of his nearest relatives andfriends, except on the solitary occasion of the departure of Don FerranteGonzaga from court. Such a temperament was invaluable in the stormycareer to which he had devoted his life. He was essentially a man ofaction, a military chieftain. "Pray only for my health and my life, " hewas accustomed to say to the young officers who came to him from everypart of his dominions to serve under his banners, "for so, long as I havethese I will never leave you idle; at least in France. I love peace nobetter than the rest of you. I was born and bred to arms, and must ofnecessity keep on my harness till I can bear it no longer. " The restlessenergy and the magnificent tranquillity of his character made him a heroamong princes, an idol with his officers, a popular favorite every where. The promptness with which, at much personal hazard, he descended like athunderbolt in the midst of the Ghent insurrection; the juvenile ardorwith which the almost bedridden man arose from his sick-bed to smite theProtestants at Muhlberg; the grim stoicism with which he saw sixtythousand of his own soldiers perish in the wintry siege of Metz; allensured him a large measure of that applause which ever follows militarydistinction, especially when the man who achieves it happens to wear acrown. He combined the personal prowess of a knight of old with the moremodern accomplishments of a scientific tactician. He could charge theenemy in person like the most brilliant cavalry officer, and hethoroughly understood the arrangements of a campaign, the marshalling andvictualling of troops, and the whole art of setting and maintaining anarmy in the field. 

Yet, though brave and warlike as the most chivalrous of his ancestors, Gothic, Burgundian, or Suabian, he was entirely without chivalry. Fanaticism for the faith, protection for the oppressed, fidelity tofriend and foe, knightly loyalty to a cause deemed sacred, the sacrificeof personal interests to great ideas, generosity of hand and heart; allthose qualities which unite with courage and constancy to make up theideal chevalier, Charles not only lacked but despised. He trampled on theweak antagonist, whether burgher or petty potentate. He was false aswater. He inveigled his foes who trusted to imperial promises, by artsunworthy an emperor or a gentleman. He led about the unfortunate JohnFrederic of Saxony, in his own language, "like a bear in a chain, " readyto be slipped upon Maurice should "the boy" prove ungrateful. He connivedat the famous forgery of the prelate of Arras, to which the LandgravePhilip owed his long imprisonment; a villany worse than many for whichhumbler rogues have suffered by thousands upon the gallows. Thecontemporary world knew well the history of his frauds, on scale bothcolossal and minute, and called him familiarly "Charles qui triche. "

The absolute master of realms on which the sun perpetually shone, he wasnot only greedy for additional dominion, but he was avaricious in smallmatters, and hated to part with a hundred dollars. To the soldier whobrought him the sword and gauntlets of Francis the First, he gave ahundred crowns, when ten thousand would have been less than the customarypresent; so that the man left his presence full of desperation. The threesoldiers who swam the Elbe, with their swords in their mouths; to bringhim the boats with which he passed to the victory of Muhlberg, receivedfrom his imperial bounty a doublet, a pair of stockings, and four crownsapiece. His courtiers and ministers complained bitterly of his habitualniggardliness, and were fain to eke out their slender salaries byaccepting bribes from every hand rich enough to bestow them. In truthCharles was more than any thing else a politician, notwithstanding hissignal abilities as a soldier. If to have founded institutions whichcould last, be the test of statesmanship, he was even a statesman; formany of his institutions have resisted the pressure of three centuries. But those of Charlemagne fell as soon as his hand was cold, while theworks of many ordinary legislators have attained to a perpetuity deniedto the statutes of Solon or Lycurgus. Durability is not the test of meritin human institutions. Tried by the only touchstone applicable togovernments, their capacity to insure the highest welfare of thegoverned, we shall not find his polity deserving of much admiration. Itis not merely that he was a despot by birth and inclination, nor that henaturally substituted as far as was practicable, the despotic for therepublican element, wherever his hand can be traced. There may bepossible good in despotisms as there is often much tyranny in democracy. Tried however according to the standard by which all governments may bemeasured, those laws of truth and divine justice which all Christiannations recognize, and which are perpetual, whether recognized or not, weshall find little to venerate in the life work of the Emperor. Theinterests of his family, the security of his dynasty, these were his endand aim. The happiness or the progress of his people never furnished eventhe indirect motives of his conduct, and the result was a baffled policyand a crippled and bankrupt empire at last. 

He knew men, especially he knew their weaknesses, and he knew how to turnthem to account. He knew how much they would bear, and that littlegrievances would sometimes inflame more than vast and deliberateinjustice. Therefore he employed natives mainly in the subordinateoffices of his various states, and he repeatedly warned his successorthat the haughtiness of Spaniards and the incompatibility of theircharacter with the Flemish, would be productive of great difficulties anddangers. It was his opinion that men might be tyrannized moreintelligently by their own kindred, and in this perhaps he was right. Hewas indefatigable in the discharge of business, and if it were possiblethat half a world could be administered as if it were the privateproperty of an individual, the task would have been perhaps as wellaccomplished by Charles as by any man. He had not the absurdity ofsupposing it possible for him to attend to the details of everyindividual affair in every one of his realms; and he therefore intrustedthe stewardship of all specialities to his various ministers and agents. It was his business to know men and to deal with affairs on a largescale, and in this he certainly was superior to his successor. Hiscorrespondence was mainly in the hands of Granvelle the elder, whoanalyzed letters received, and frequently wrote all but the signatures ofthe answers. The same minister usually possessed the imperial ear, andfarmed it out for his own benefit. In all this there was of course roomfor vast deception, but the Emperor was quite aware of what was going on, and took a philosophic view of the matter as an inevitable part of hissystem. Granvelle grew enormously rich under his eye by trading on theimperial favor and sparing his majesty much trouble. Charles saw it all, ridiculed his peculations, but called him his "bed of down. " Hisknowledge of human nature was however derived from a contemplation mainlyof its weaknesses, and was therefore one-sided. He was often deceived, and made many a fatal blunder, shrewd politician though he was. Heinvolved himself often in enterprises which could not be honorable orprofitable, and which inflicted damage on his greatest interests. Heoften offended men who might have been useful friends, and convertedallies into enemies. "His Majesty, " said a keen observer who knew himwell, "has not in his career shown the prudence which was necessary tohim. He has often offended those whose love he might have conciliated, converted friends into enemies, and let those perish who were his mostfaithful partisans. " Thus it must be acknowledged that even his boastedknowledge of human nature and his power of dealing with men was rathersuperficial and empirical than the real gift of genius. 

His personal habits during the greater part of his life were those of anindefatigable soldier. He could remain in the saddle day and night, andendure every hardship but hunger. He was addicted to vulgar andmiscellaneous incontinence. He was an enormous eater. He breakfasted atfive, on a fowl seethed in milk and dressed with sugar and spices. Afterthis he went to sleep again. He dined at twelve, partaking always oftwenty dishes. He supped twice; at first, soon after vespers, and thesecond time at midnight or one o'clock, which meal was, perhaps, the mostsolid of the four. After meat he ate a great quantity of pastry andsweetmeats, and he irrigated every repast by vast draughts of beer andwine. His stomach, originally a wonderful one, succumbed after fortyyears of such labors. His taste, but not his appetite began to fail, andhe complained to his majordomo, that all his food was insipid. The replyis, perhaps, among the most celebrated of facetia. The cook could donothing more unless he served his Majesty a pasty of watches. Theallusion to the Emperor's passion for horology was received with greatapplause. Charles "laughed longer than he was ever known to laugh before, and all the courtiers (of course) laughed as long as his Majesty. "[Badovaro] The success of so sorry a jest would lead one to suppose thatthe fooling was less admirable at the imperial court than some of therecorded quips of Tribaulet would lead us to suppose. 

The transfer of the other crowns and dignitaries to Philip, wasaccomplished a month afterwards, in a quiet manner. Spain, Sicily, theBalearic Islands, America, and other portions of the globe, were madeover without more display than an ordinary 'donatio inter vivos'. TheEmpire occasioned some difficulty. It had been already signified toFerdinand, that his brother was to resign the imperial crown in hisfavor, and the symbols of sovereignty were accordingly transmitted to himby the hands of William of Orange. A deputation, moreover, of which thatnobleman, Vice-Chancellor Seld, and Dr. Wolfgang Haller were the chiefs, was despatched to signify to the electors of the Empire the step whichhad been thus resolved upon. A delay of more than two years, however, intervened, occasioned partly by the deaths of three electors, partly bythe war which so soon broke out in Europe, before the matter was formallyacted upon. In February, 1553, however, the electors, having beenassembled in Frankfort, received the abdication of Charles, and proceededto the election of Ferdinand. That Emperor was crowned in March, andimmediately despatched a legation to the Pope to apprize him of the fact. Nothing was less expected than any opposition on the part of the pontiff. The querulous dotard, however, who then sat in St. Peter's chair, hatedCharles and all his race. He accordingly denied the validity of the wholetransaction, without sanction previously obtained from the Pope, to whomall crowns belonged. Ferdinand, after listening, through his envoys, tomuch ridiculous dogmatism on the part of the Pope, at last withdrew fromthe discussion, with a formal protest, and was first recognized byCaraffa's successor, Pius IV. 

Charles had not deferred his retirement till the end of these disputes. He occupied a private house in Brussels, near the gate of Louvain, untilAugust of the year 1556. On the 27th of that month, he addressed a letterfrom Ghent to John of Osnabruck, president of the Chamber of Spiers, stating his abdication in favor of Ferdinand, and requesting that in theinterim the same obedience might be rendered to Ferdinand, as could havebeen yielded to himself. Ten days later; he addressed a letter to theestates of the Empire, stating the same fact; and on the 17th September, 1556, he set sail from Zeland for Spain. These delays and difficultiesoccasioned some misconceptions. Many persons who did not admire anabdication, which others, on the contrary, esteemed as an act ofunexampled magnanimity, stoutly denied that it was the intention ofCharles to renounce the Empire. The Venetian envoy informed hisgovernment that Ferdinand was only to be lieutenant for Charles, understrict limitations, and that the Emperor was to resume the government sosoon as his health would allow. The Bishop of Arras and Don Juan deManrique had both assured him, he said, that Charles would not, on anyaccount, definitely abdicate. Manrique even asserted that it was a merefarce to believe in any such intention. The Emperor ought to remain toprotect his son, by the resources of the Empire, against France, theTurks, and the heretics. His very shadow was terrible to the Lutherans, and his form might be expected to rise again in stern reality from itstemporary grave. Time has shown the falsity of all these imaginings, butviews thus maintained by those in the best condition to know the truth, prove how difficult it was for men to believe in a transaction which wasthen so extraordinary, and how little consonant it was in their eyes withtrue propriety. It was necessary to ascend to the times of Diocletian, tofind an example of a similar abdication of empire, on so deliberate andextensive a scale, and the great English historian of the Roman Empirehas compared the two acts with each other. But there seems a vastdifference between the cases. Both emperors were distinguished soldiers;both were merciless persecutors of defenceless Christians; both exchangedunbounded empire for absolute seclusion. But Diocletian was born in thelowest abyss of human degradation--the slave and the son of a slave. Forsuch a man, after having reached the highest pinnacle of human greatness, voluntarily to descend from power, seems an act of far greatermagnanimity than the retreat of Charles. Born in the purple, havingexercised unlimited authority from his boyhood, and having worn from hiscradle so many crowns and coronets, the German Emperor might well besupposed to have learned to estimate them at their proper value. Contemporary minds were busy, however, to discover the hidden motiveswhich could have influenced him, and the world, even yet, has hardlyceased to wonder. Yet it would have been more wonderful, considering theEmperor's character, had he remained. The end had not crowned the work;it not unreasonably discrowned the workman. The earlier, and indeed thegreater part of his career had been one unbroken procession of triumphs. The cherished dream of his grandfather, and of his own youth, to add thePope's triple crown to the rest of the hereditary possessions of hisfamily, he had indeed been obliged to resign. He had too much practicalFlemish sense to indulge long in chimeras, but he had achieved the Empireover formidable rivals, and he had successively not only conquered, butcaptured almost every potentate who had arrayed himself in arms againsthim. Clement and Francis, the Dukes and Landgraves of, Clever, Hesse, Saxony, and Brunswick, he had bound to his chariot wheels; forcing manyto eat the bread of humiliation and captivity, during long and wearyyears. But the concluding portion of his reign had reversed all itsprevious glories. His whole career had been a failure. He had beendefeated, after all, in most of his projects. He had humbled Francis, butHenry had most signally avenged his father. He had trampled upon Philipof Hesse and Frederic of Saxony, but it had been reserved for one of thatGerman race, which he characterized as "dreamy, drunken, and incapable ofintrigue, " to outwit the man who had outwitted all the world, and todrive before him, in ignominious flight, the conqueror of the nations. The German lad who had learned both war and dissimulation in the courtand camp of him who was so profound a master of both arts, was destinedto eclipse his teacher on the most august theatre of Christendom. Absorbed at Innspruck with the deliberations of the Trent Council, Charles had not heeded the distant mutterings of the tempest which wasgathering around him. While he was preparing to crush, forever, theProtestant Church, with the arms which a bench of bishops were forging, lo! the rapid and desperate Maurice, with long red beard streaming like ameteor in the wind, dashing through the mountain passes, at the head ofhis lancers--arguments more convincing than all the dogmas of Granvelle!Disguised as an old woman, the Emperor had attempted on the 6th April, toescape in a peasant's wagon, from Innspruck into Flanders. Saved for thetime by the mediation of Ferdinand, he had, a few weeks later, after histroops had been defeated by Maurice, at Fussen, again fled at midnight ofthe 22nd May, almost unattended, sick in body and soul, in the midst ofthunder, lightning, and rain, along the difficult Alpine passes fromInnspruck into Carinthia. His pupil had permitted his escape, onlybecause in his own language, "for such a bird he had no convenient cage. "The imprisoned princes now owed their liberation, not to the Emperor'sclemency, but to his panic. The peace of Passau, in the following August, crushed the whole fabric of the Emperor's toil, and laid-the foundationof the Protestant Church. He had smitten the Protestants at Muhlberg forthe last time. On the other hand, the man who had dealt with Rome, as ifthe Pope, not he, had been the vassal, was compelled to witness, beforehe departed, the insolence of a pontiff who took a special pride ininsulting and humbling his house, and trampling upon the pride ofCharles, Philip and Ferdinand. In France too, the disastrous siege ofMetz had taught him that in the imperial zodiac the fatal sign of Cancerhad been reached. The figure of a crab, with the words "plus citra, "instead of his proud motto of "plus ultra, " scrawled on the walls wherehe had resided during that dismal epoch, avenged more deeply, perhaps, than the jester thought, the previous misfortunes of France. The GrandTurk, too, Solyman the Magnificent, possessed most of Hungary, and heldat that moment a fleet ready to sail against Naples, in co-operation withthe Pope and France. Thus the Infidel, the Protestant, and the HolyChurch were all combined together to crush him. Towards all the greatpowers of the earth, he stood not in the attitude of a conqueror, but ofa disappointed, baffled, defeated potentate. Moreover, he had been foiledlong before in his earnest attempts to secure the imperial throne forPhilip. Ferdinand and Maximilian had both stoutly resisted his argumentsand his blandishments. The father had represented the slender patrimonyof their branch of the family, compared with the enormous heritage ofPhilip; who, being after all, but a man, and endowed with finite powers, might sink under so great a pressure of empire as his father wished toprovide for him. Maximilian, also, assured his uncle that he had as goodan appetite for the crown as Philip, and could digest the dignity quiteas easily. The son, too, for whom the Emperor was thus solicitous, hadalready, before the abdication, repaid his affection with ingratitude. Hehad turned out all his father's old officials in Milan, and had refusedto visit him at Brussels, till assured as to the amount of ceremonialrespect which the new-made king was to receive at the hands of hisfather. 

Had the Emperor continued to live and reign, he would have found himselflikewise engaged in mortal combat with that great religious movement inthe Netherlands, which he would not have been able many years longer tosuppress, and which he left as a legacy of blood and fire to hissuccessor. Born in the same year with his century, Charles was adecrepit, exhausted man at fifty-five, while that glorious age, in whichhumanity was to burst forever the cerements in which it had so long beenburied, was but awakening to a consciousness of its strength. 

Disappointed in his schemes, broken in his fortunes, with incomeanticipated, estates mortgaged, all his affairs in confusion; failing inmental powers, and with a constitution hopelessly shattered; it was timefor him to retire. He showed his keenness in recognizing the fact thatneither his power nor his glory would be increased, should he lagsuperfluous on the stage where mortification instead of applause waslikely to be his portion. His frame was indeed but a wreck. Forty yearsof unexampled gluttony had done their work. He was a victim to gout, asthma, dyspepsia, gravel. He was crippled in the neck, arms, knees, andhands. He was troubled with chronic cutaneous eruptions. His appetiteremained, while his stomach, unable longer to perform the task stillimposed upon it, occasioned him constant suffering. Physiologists, whoknow how important a part this organ plays in the affairs of life, willperhaps see in this physical condition of the Emperor A sufficientexplanation, if explanation were required, of his descent from thethrone. Moreover, it is well known that the resolution to abdicate beforehis death had been long a settled scheme with him. It had been formallyagreed between himself and the Empress that they should separate at theapproach of old age, and pass the remainder of their lives in a conventand a monastery. He had, when comparatively a young man, been struck bythe reply made to him by an aged officer, whose reasons he had asked for, earnestly soliciting permission to retire from the imperial service. Itwas, said the veteran, that he might put a little space of religiouscontemplation between the active portion of his life and the grave. 

A similar determination, deferred from time to time, Charles had nowcarried into execution. While he still lingered in Brussels, after hisabdication, a comet appeared, to warn him to the fulfilment of hispurpose. From first to last, comets and other heavenly bodies were muchconnected with his evolutions and arrangements. There was no mistakingthe motives with which this luminary had presented itself. The Emperorknew very well, says a contemporary German chronicler, that it portendedpestilence and war, together with the approaching death of mightyprinces. "My fates call out, " he cried, and forthwith applied himself tohasten the preparations for his departure. 

The romantic picture of his philosophical retirement at Juste, paintedoriginally by Sandoval and Siguenza, reproduced by the fascinating pencilof Strada, and imitated in frequent succession by authors of every ageand country, is unfortunately but a sketch of fancy. The investigationsof modern writers have entirely thrown down the scaffolding on which theairy fabric, so delightful to poets and moralists, reposed. The departingEmperor stands no longer in a transparency robed in shining garments. Histransfiguration is at an end. Every action, almost every moment of hisretirement, accurately chronicled by those who shared his solitude, havebeen placed before our eyes, in the most felicitous manner, by able andbrilliant writers. The Emperor, shorn of the philosophical robe in whichhe had been conventionally arrayed for three centuries, shivers now inthe cold air of reality. 

So far from his having immersed himself in profound and piouscontemplation, below the current of the world's events, his thoughts, onthe contrary, never were for a moment diverted from the political surfaceof the times. He read nothing but despatches; he wrote or dictatedinterminable ones in reply, as dull and prolix as any which ever camefrom his pen. He manifested a succession of emotions at the course ofcontemporary affairs, as intense and as varied, as if the world stillrested in his palm. He was, in truth, essentially a man of action. He hadneither the taste nor talents which make a man great in retirement. Not alofty thought, not a generous sentiment, not a profound or acutesuggestion in his retreat has been recorded from his lips. The epigramswhich had been invented for him by fabulists have been all taken away, and nothing has been substituted, save a few dull jests exchanged withstupid friars. So far from having entertained and even expressed thatsentiment of religious toleration for which he was said to have beencondemned as a heretic by the inquisition, and for which Philip wasridiculously reported to have ordered his father's body to be burned, andhis ashes scattered to the winds, he became in retreat the bigoteffectually, which during his reign he had only been conventionally. Bitter regrets that he should have kept his word to Luther, as if he hadnot broken faith enough to reflect upon in his retirement; sternself-reproach for omitting to put to death, while he had him in hispower, the man who had caused all the mischief of the age; fierceinstructions thundered from his retreat to the inquisitors to hasten theexecution of all heretics, including particularly his ancient friends, preachers and almoners, Cazalla and Constantine de Fuente; furiousexhortations to Philip--as if Philip needed a prompter in such awork--that he should set himself to "cutting out the root of heresy withrigor and rude chastisement;"--such explosions of savage bigotry asthese, alternating with exhibitions of revolting gluttony, with surfeitsof sardine omelettes, Estramadura sausages, eel pies, pickled partridges, fat capons, quince syrups, iced beer, and flagons of Rhenish, relieved bycopious draughts of senna and rhubarb, to which his horror-strickendoctor doomed him as he ate--compose a spectacle less attractive to theimagination than the ancient portrait of the cloistered Charles. Unfortunately it is the one which was painted from life. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive (100, 000) Despot by birth and inclination (Charles V. ) Endure every hardship but hunger Gallant and ill-fated Lamoral Egmont He knew men, especially he knew their weaknesses His imagination may have assisted his memory in the task Little grievances would sometimes inflame more than vast Often much tyranny in democracy Planted the inquisition in the Netherlands

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 4. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER II. 1555-1558

 Sketch of Philip the Second--Characteristics of Mary Tudor--Portrait of Philip--His council--Rivalry of Rup Gomez and Alva--Character of Rup Gomez--Queen Mary of Hungary--Sketch of Philibert of Savoy-- Truce of Vaucelles--Secret treaty between the Pope and Henry II. -- Rejoicings in the Netherlands on account of the Peace--Purposes of Philip--Re-enactment of the edict of 1560--The King's dissimulation --"Request" to the provinces--Infraction of the truce in Italy-- Character of Pope Paul IV. --Intrigues of Cardinal Caraffa--War against Spain resolved upon by France--Campaign in Italy--Amicable siege of Rome--Pence with the pontiff--Hostilities on the Flemish border--Coligny foiled at Douay--Sacks Lens--Philip in England-- Queen Mary engages in the war--Philip's army assembled at Givet-- Portrait of Count Egmont--The French army under Coligny and Montmorency--Siege of St. Quentin--Attempts of the constable to relieve the city--Battle of St. Quentin--Hesitation and timidity of Philip--City of St. Quentin taken and sacked--Continued indecision of Philip--His army disbanded--Campaign of the Duke of Guise-- Capture of Calais--Interview between Cardinal de Lorraine and the Bishop of Arran--Secret combinations for a league between France and Spain against heresy--Languid movements of Guise--Foray of De Thermes on the Flemish frontier--Battle of Gravelines--Popularity of Egmont--Enmity of Alva. 

Philip the Second had received the investiture of Milan and the crown ofNaples, previously to his marriage with Mary Tudor. The imperial crown hehad been obliged, much against his will, to forego. The archduchy ofAustria, with the hereditary German dependencies of his father's family, had been transferred by the Emperor to his brother Ferdinand, on theoccasion of the marriage of that prince with Anna, only sister of KingLouis of Hungary. Ten years afterwards, Ferdinand (King of Hungary andBohemia since the death of Louis, slain in 1526 at the battle of Mohacz)was elected King of the Romans, and steadily refused all the entreatiesafterwards made to him in behalf of Philip, to resign his crown and hissuccession to the Empire, in favor of his nephew. With these diminutions, Philip had now received all the dominions of his father. He was King ofall the Spanish kingdoms and of both the Sicilies. He was titular King ofEngland, France, and Jerusalem. He was "Absolute Dominator" in Asia, Africa, and America; he was Duke of Milan and of both Burgundies, andHereditary Sovereign of the seventeen Netherlands. 

Thus the provinces had received a new master. A man of foreign birth andbreeding, not speaking a word of their language, nor of any languagewhich the mass of the inhabitants understood, was now placed in supremeauthority over them, because he represented, through the females, the"good" Philip of Burgundy, who a century before had possessed himself byinheritance, purchase, force, or fraud, of the sovereignty in most ofthose provinces. It is necessary to say an introductory word or twoconcerning the previous history of the man to whose hands the destiny ofso many millions was now entrusted. 

He was born in May, 1527, and was now therefore twenty-eight years ofage. At the age of sixteen he had been united to his cousin, Maria ofPortugal, daughter of John III. And of the Emperor's sister, DonnaCatalina. In the following year (1544) he became father of the celebratedand ill-starred Don Carlos, and a widower. The princess owed her death, it was said, to her own imprudence and to the negligence or bigotry ofher attendants. The Duchess of Alva, and other ladies who had charge ofher during her confinement, deserted her chamber in order to obtainabsolution by witnessing an auto-da-fe of heretics. During their absence, the princess partook voraciously of a melon, and forfeited her life inconsequence. 

In 1548, Don Philip had made his first appearance in the Netherlands. Hecame thither to receive homage in the various provinces as their futuresovereign, and to exchange oaths of mutual fidelity with them all. AndrewDoria, with a fleet of fifty ships, had brought him to Genoa, whence hehad passed to Milan, where he was received with great rejoicing. At Trenthe was met by Duke Maurice of Saxony, who warmly begged his intercessionwith the Emperor in behalf of the imprisoned Landgrave of Hesse. Thisboon Philip was graciously pleased to promise, --and to keep the pledge assacredly as most of the vows plighted by him during this memorable year. The Duke of Aerschot met him in Germany with a regiment of cavalry andescorted him to Brussels. A summer was spent in great festivities, thecities of the Nether lands vieing with each other in magnificentcelebrations of the ceremonies, by which Philip successively sworeallegiance to the various constitutions and charters of the provinces, and received their oaths of future fealty in return. His oath to supportall the constitutions and privileges was without reservation, while hisfather and grandfather had only sworn to maintain the charters granted orconfirmed by Philip and Charles of Burgundy. Suspicion was disarmed bythese indiscriminate concessions, which had been resolved upon by theunscrupulous Charles to conciliate the good will of the people. In viewof the pretensions which might be preferred by the Brederode family inHolland, and by other descendants of ancient sovereign races in otherprovinces, the Emperor, wishing to ensure the succession to his sistersin case of the deaths of himself, Philip, and Don Carlos without issue, was unsparing in those promises which he knew to be binding only upon theweak. Although the house of Burgundy had usurped many of the provinces onthe express pretext that females could not inherit, the rule had beenalready violated, and he determined to spare no pains to conciliate theestates, in order that they might be content with a new violation, shouldthe contingency occur. Philip's oaths were therefore without reserve, andthe light-hearted Flemings, Brabantines, and Walloons received him withopen arms. In Valenciennes the festivities which attended his entrancewere on a most gorgeous scale, but the "joyous entrance" arranged for himat Antwerp was of unparalleled magnificence. A cavalcade of themagistrates and notable burghers, "all attired in cramoisy velvet, "attended by lackies in splendid liveries and followed by four thousandcitizen soldiers in full uniform, went forth from the gates to receivehim. Twenty-eight triumphal arches, which alone, according to the thriftychronicler, had cost 26, 800 Carolus guldens, were erected in thedifferent streets and squares, and every possible demonstration ofaffectionate welcome was lavished upon the Prince and the Emperor. Therich and prosperous city, unconscious of the doom which awaited it in thefuture, seemed to have covered itself with garlands to honor the approachof its master. Yet icy was the deportment with which Philip receivedthese demonstrations of affection, and haughty the glance with which helooked down upon these exhibitions of civic hilarity, as from the heightof a grim and inaccessible tower. The impression made upon theNetherlanders was any thing but favorable, and when he had fullyexperienced the futility of the projects on the Empire which it was sodifficult both for his father and himself to resign, he returned to themore congenial soil of Spain. In 1554 he had again issued from thepeninsula to marry the Queen of England, a privilege which his father hadgraciously resigned to him. He was united to Mary Tudor at Winchester, onthe 25th July of that year, and if congeniality of tastes could have madea marriage happy, that union should have been thrice blessed. To maintainthe supremacy of the Church seemed to both the main object of existence, to execute unbelievers the most sacred duty imposed by the Deity uponanointed princes, to convert their kingdoms into a hell the surest meansof winning Heaven for themselves. It was not strange that the conjunctionof two such wonders of superstition in one sphere should have seemedportentous in the eyes of the English nation. Philip's mock efforts infavor of certain condemned reformers, and his pretended intercessions infavor of the Princess Elizabeth, failed entirely of their object. Theparliament refused to confer upon him more than a nominal authority inEngland. His children, should they be born, might be sovereigns; he wasbut husband of the Queen; of a woman who could not atone by her abjectbut peevish fondness for himself, and by her congenial blood-thirstinesstowards her subjects, for her eleven years seniority, her deficiency inattractions, and her incapacity to make him the father of a line ofEnglish monarchs. It almost excites compassion even for Mary Tudor, whenher passionate efforts to inspire him with affection are contrasted withhis impassiveness. Tyrant, bigot, murderess though she was, she was stillwoman, and she lavished upon her husband all that was not ferocious inher nature. Forbidding prayers to be said for the soul of her father, hating her sister and her people, burning bishops, bathing herself in theblood of heretics, to Philip she was all submissiveness and femininedevotion. It was a most singular contrast, Mary, the Queen of England andMary the wife of Philip. Small, lean and sickly, painfully near-sighted, yet with an eye of fierceness and fire; her face wrinkled by the hands ofcare and evil passions still more than by Time, with a big man's voice, whose harshness made those in the next room tremble; yet feminine in hertastes, skilful with her needle, fond of embroidery work, striking thelute with a touch remarkable for its science and feeling, speaking manylanguages, including Latin, with fluency and grace; most feminine, too, in her constitutional sufferings, hysterical of habit, shedding floods oftears daily at Philip's coldness, undisguised infidelity, and frequentabsences from England--she almost awakens compassion and causes amomentary oblivion of her identity. 

Her subjects, already half maddened by religious persecution, wereexasperated still further by the pecuniary burthens which she imposedupon them to supply the King's exigencies, and she unhesitatinglyconfronted their frenzy, in the hope of winning a smile from him. When atlast her chronic maladies had assumed the memorable form which causedPhilip and Mary to unite in a letter to Cardinal Pole, announcing not theexpected but the actual birth of a prince, but judiciously leaving thedate in blank, the momentary satisfaction and delusion of the Queen wasunbounded. The false intelligence was transmitted every where. Great werethe joy and the festivities in the Netherlands, where people were soeasily made to rejoice and keep holiday for any thing. "The Regent, beingin Antwerp, " wrote Sir Thomas Gresham to the lords of council, "did causethe great bell to rings to give all men to understand that the news wastrewe. The Queene's highness here merchants caused all our Inglishe shipsto shoote off with such joy and triumph, as by men's arts and polliceycoulde be devised--and the Regent sent our Inglishe maroners one hundredcrownes to drynke. " If bell-ringing and cannon-firing could have givenEngland a Spanish sovereign, the devoutly-wished consummation would havebeen reached. When the futility of the royal hopes could no longer beconcealed, Philip left the country, never to return till his war withFrance made him require troops, subsidies, and a declaration ofhostilities from England. 

The personal appearance of the new sovereign has already been described. His manner was far from conciliatory, and in this respect he was theabsolute reverse of his father. Upon his first journey out of Spain, in1548, into his various dominions, he had made a most painful impressionevery where. "He was disagreeable, " says Envoy Suriano, "to the Italians, detestable to the Flemings, odious to the Germans. "

The remonstrances of the Emperor, and of Queen Mary of Hungary, at theimpropriety of his manners, had produced, however, some effect, so thaton his wedding journey to England, he manifested much "gentleness andhumanity, mingled with royal gravity. " Upon this occasion, says anotherVenetian, accredited to him, "he had divested himself of that Spanishhaughtiness, which, when he first came from Spain, had rendered him soodious. " The famous ambassador, Badovaro confirms the impression. "Uponhis first journey, " he says, "he was esteemed proud, and too greedy forthe imperial succession; but now 'tis the common opinion that hishumanity and modesty are all which could be desired. " These humanequalities, however, it must be observed, were exhibited only in thepresence of ambassadors and grandees, the only representatives of"humanity" with whom he came publicly and avowedly in contact. 

He was thought deficient in manly energy. He was an infirmvaletudinarian, and was considered as sluggish in character, as deficientin martial enterprise, as timid of temperament as he was fragile andsickly of frame. It is true, that on account of the disappointment whichhe occasioned by his contrast to his warlike father, he mingled in sometournaments in Brussels, where he was matched against Count Mansfeld, oneof the most distinguished chieftains of the age, and where, says hisprofessed panegyrist, "he broke his lances very mach to the satisfactionof his father and aunts. "

That learned and eloquent author, Estelle Calvete, even filled thegreater part of a volume, in which he described the journey of thePrince, with a minute description of these feasts and jousts, but we mayreasonably conclude that to the loyal imagination of his eulogist Philipis indebted for most of these knightly trophies. It was the universalopinion of unprejudiced cotemporaries, that he was without a spark ofenterprise. He was even censured for a culpable want of ambition, and forbeing inferior to his father in this respect, as if the love ofencroaching on his neighbor's dominions, and a disposition to foreign. Commotions and war would have constituted additional virtues, had hehappened to possess them. Those who were most disposed to think favorablyof him, remembered that there was a time when even Charles the Fifth wasthought weak and indolent, and were willing to ascribe Philip's pacificdisposition to his habitual cholic and side-ache, and to his father'sinordinate care for him in youth. They even looked forward to the timewhen he should blaze forth to the world as a conqueror and a hero. These, however, were views entertained by but few; the general and the correctopinion, as it proved, being, that Philip hated war, would nevercertainly acquire any personal distinction in the field, and when engagedin hostilities would be apt to gather his laurels at the hands of hisgenerals, rather than with his own sword. He was believed to be thereverse of the Emperor. Charles sought great enterprises, Philip wouldavoid them. The Emperor never recoiled before threats; the son wasreserved, cautious, suspicious of all men, and capable of sacrificing arealm from hesitation and timidity. The father had a genius for action, the son a predilection for repose. Charles took "all men's opinions, butreserved his judgment, " and acted on it, when matured, with irresistibleenergy; Philip was led by others, was vacillating in forming decisions, and irresolute in executing them when formed. 

Philip, then, was not considered, in that warlike age, as likely to shineas a warrior. His mental capacity, in general, was likewise not veryhighly esteemed. His talents were, in truth, very much below mediocrity. His mind was incredibly small. A petty passion for contemptible detailscharacterized him from his youth, and, as long as he lived, he couldneither learn to generalize, nor understand that one man, howeverdiligent, could not be minutely acquainted with all the public andprivate affairs of fifty millions of other men. He was a glutton of work. He was born to write despatches, and to scrawl comments upon those whichhe received. 

 [The character of these apostilles, always confused, wordy and awkward, was sometimes very ludicrous; nor did it improve after his thirty or forty years' daily practice in making them. Thus, when he received a letter from France in 1589, narrating the assassination of Henry III. , and stating that "the manner in which he had been killed was that a Jacobin monk had given him a pistol-shot in the head" (la facon qua l'on dit qu'il a ette tue, sa ette par un Jacobin qui luy a donna d'un cou de pistolle dans la tayte), he scrawled the following luminous comment upon the margin. Underlining the word "pistolle, " he observed, "this is perhaps some kind of knife; and as for 'tayte, ' it can be nothing else but head, which is not tayte, but tete, or teyte, as you very well know" (quiza de alguna manera de cuchillo, etc. , etc. )--Gachard. Rapport a M. Le Minist. De l'Interieur, prefixed to corresp. Philippe II. Vol. I. Xlix. Note 1. It is obvious that a person who made such wonderful commentaries as this, and was hard at work eight or nine hours a day for forty years, would leave a prodigious quantity of unpublished matter at his death. ]

He often remained at the council-board four or five hours at a time, andhe lived in his cabinet. He gave audiences to ambassadors and deputiesvery willingly, listening attentively to all that was said to him, andanswering in monosyllables. He spoke no tongue but Spanish; and wassufficiently sparing of that, but he was indefatigable with his pen. Hehated to converse, but he could write a letter eighteen pages long, whenhis correspondent was in the next room, and when the subject was, perhaps, one which a man of talent could have settled with six words ofhis tongue. The world, in his opinion, was to move upon protocols andapostilles. Events had no right to be born throughout his dominions, without a preparatory course of his obstetrical pedantry. He could neverlearn that the earth would not rest on its axis, while he wrote aprogramme of the way it was to turn. He was slow in deciding, slower incommunicating his decisions. He was prolix with his pen, not fromaffluence, but from paucity of ideas. He took refuge in a cloud of words, sometimes to conceal his meaning, oftener to conceal the absence of anymeaning, thus mystifying not only others but himself. To one greatpurpose, formed early, he adhered inflexibly. This, however, was ratheran instinct than an opinion; born with him, not created by him. The ideaseemed to express itself through him, and to master him, rather than toform one of a stock of sentiments which a free agent might be expected topossess. Although at certain times, even this master-feeling could yieldto the pressure of a predominant self-interest-thus showing that even inPhilip bigotry was not absolute--yet he appeared on the whole theembodiment of Spanish chivalry and Spanish religious enthusiasm, in itslate and corrupted form. He was entirely a Spaniard. The Burgundian andAustrian elements of his blood seemed to have evaporated, and his veinswere filled alone with the ancient ardor, which in heroic centuries hadanimated the Gothic champions of Spain. The fierce enthusiasm for theCross, which in the long internal warfare against the Crescent, had beenthe romantic and distinguishing feature of the national character, haddegenerated into bigotry. That which had been a nation's glory now madethe monarch's shame. The Christian heretic was to be regarded with a moreintense hatred than even Moor or Jew had excited in the most Christianages, and Philip was to be the latest and most perfect incarnation of allthis traditional enthusiasm, this perpetual hate. Thus he was likely tobe single-hearted in his life. It was believed that his ambition would beless to extend his dominions than to vindicate his title of the mostCatholic king. There could be little doubt entertained that he would be, at least, dutiful to his father in this respect, and that the edictswould be enforced to the letter. 

He was by birth, education, and character, a Spaniard, and that soexclusively, that the circumstance would alone have made him unfit togovern a country so totally different in habits and national sentimentsfrom his native land. He was more a foreigner in Brussels, even, than inEngland. The gay, babbling, energetic, noisy life of Flanders and Brabantwas detestable to him. The loquacity of the Netherlanders was a continualreproach upon his taciturnity. His education had imbued him, too, withthe antiquated international hatred of Spaniard and Fleming, which hadbeen strengthening in the metropolis, while the more rapid current oflife had rather tended to obliterate the sentiment in the provinces. 

The flippancy and profligacy of Philip the Handsome, the extortion andinsolence of his Flemish courtiers, had not been forgotten in Spain, norhad Philip the Second forgiven his grandfather for having been aforeigner. And now his mad old grandmother, Joanna, who had for yearsbeen chasing cats in the lonely tower where she had been so longimprisoned, had just died; and her funeral, celebrated with great pomp byboth her sons, by Charles at Brussels and Ferdinand at Augsburg, seemedto revive a history which had begun to fade, and to recall the image ofCastilian sovereignty which had been so long obscured in the blaze ofimperial grandeur. 

His education had been but meagre. In an age when all kings and noblemenpossessed many languages, he spoke not a word of any tongue butSpanish, --although he had a slender knowledge of French and Italian, which he afterwards learned to read with comparative facility. He hadstudied a little history and geography, and he had a taste for sculpture, painting, and architecture. Certainly if he had not possessed a feelingfor art, he would have been a monster. To have been born in the earlierpart of the sixteenth century, to have been a king, to have had Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands as a birthright, and not to have been inspiredwith a spark of that fire which glowed so intensely in those favoredlands and in that golden age, had indeed been difficult. 

The King's personal habits were regular. His delicate health made itnecessary for him to attend to his diet, although he was apt to exceed insweetmeats and pastry. He slept much, and took little exercisehabitually, but he had recently been urged by the physicians to try theeffect of the chase as a corrective to his sedentary habits. He was moststrict in religious observances, as regular at mass, sermons, and vespersas a monk; much more, it was thought by many good Catholics, than wasbecoming to his rank and age. Besides several friars who preachedregularly for his instruction, he had daily discussions with others onabstruse theological points. He consulted his confessor most minutely asto all the actions of life, inquiring anxiously whether this proceedingor that were likely to burthen his conscience. He was grossly licentious. It was his chief amusement to issue forth at night disguised, that hemight indulge in vulgar and miscellaneous incontinence in the commonhaunts of vice. This was his solace at Brussels in the midst of thegravest affairs of state. He was not illiberal, but, on the contrary, itwas thought that he would have been even generous, had he not beenstraitened for money at the outset of his career. During a cold winter, he distributed alms to the poor of Brussels with an open hand. He wasfond of jests in private, and would laugh immoderately, when with a fewintimate associates, at buffooneries, which he checked in public by theicy gravity of his deportment. He dressed usually in the Spanish fashion, with close doublet, trunk hose, and short cloak, although at times heindulged in the more airy fashions of France and Burgundy, wearingbuttons on his coats and feathers in his hat. He was not thought at thattime to be cruel by nature, but was usually spoken of, in theconventional language appropriated to monarchs, as a prince "clement, benign, and debonnaire. " Time was to show the justice of his claims tosuch honorable epithets. 

The court was organized during his residence at Brussels on theBurgundian, not the Spanish model, but of the one hundred and fiftypersons who composed it, nine tenths of the whole were Spaniards; theother fifteen or sixteen being of various nations, Flemings, Burgundians, Italians, English, and Germans. Thus it is obvious how soon hedisregarded his father's precept and practice in this respect, and beganto lay the foundation of that renewed hatred to Spaniards which was soonto become so intense, exuberant, and fatal throughout every class ofNetherlanders. He esteemed no nation but the Spanish, with Spaniards heconsorted, with Spaniards he counselled, through Spaniards he governed. 

His council consisted of five or six Spanish grandees, the famous RuyGomez, then Count of Melito, afterwards Prince of Eboli; the Duke ofAlva, the Count de Feria, the Duke of Franca Villa, Don Antonio Toledo, and Don Juan Manrique de Lara. The "two columns, " said Suriano, "whichsustain this great machine, are Ruy Gomez and Alva, and from theircouncils depends the government of half the world. " The two were everbitterly opposed to each other. Incessant were their bickerings, intensetheir mutual hate, desperate and difficult the situation of any man, whether foreigner or native, who had to transact business with thegovernment. If he had secured the favor of Gomez, he had already earnedthe enmity of Alva. Was he protected by the Duke, he was sure to be castinto outer darkness by the favorite. --Alva represented the war party, RuyGomez the pacific polity more congenial to the heart of Philip. TheBishop of Arras, who in the opinion of the envoys was worth them all forhis capacity and his experience, was then entirely in the background, rarely entering the council except when summoned to give advice inaffairs of extraordinary delicacy or gravity. He was, however, toreappear most signally in course of the events already preparing. TheDuke of Alva, also to play so tremendous a part in the yet unborn historyof the Netherlands, was not beloved by Philip. He was eclipsed at thisperiod by the superior influence of the favorite, and his sword, moreover, became necessary in the Italian campaign which was impending. It is remarkable that it was a common opinion even at that day that theduke was naturally hesitating and timid. One would have thought that hisprevious victories might have earned for him the reputation for courageand skill which he most unquestionably deserved. The future was todevelop those other characteristics which were to make his name theterror and wonder of the world. 

The favorite, Ruy Gomez da Silva, Count de Melito, was the man upon whoseshoulders the great burthen of the state reposed. He was of a familywhich was originally Portuguese. He had been brought up with the King, although some eight years his senior, and their friendship dated fromearliest youth. It was said that Ruy Gomez, when a boy, had beencondemned to death for having struck Philip, who had come between him andanother page with whom he was quarrelling. The Prince threw himselfpassionately at his father's feet, and implored forgiveness in behalf ofthe culprit with such energy that the Emperor was graciously pleased tospare the life of the future prime minister. The incident was said tohave laid the foundation of the remarkable affection which was supposedto exist between the two, to an extent never witnessed before betweenking and subject. Ruy Gomez was famous for his tact and complacency, andomitted no opportunity of cementing the friendship thus auspiciouslycommenced. He was said to have particularly charmed his master, upon oneoccasion, by hypocritically throwing up his cards at a game of hazardplayed for a large stake, and permitting him to win the game with a farinferior hand. The King learning afterwards the true state of the case, was charmed by the grace and self-denial manifested by the youngnobleman. The complacency which the favorite subsequently exhibited inregard to the connexion which existed so long and so publicly between hiswife, the celebrated Princess Eboli, and Philip, placed his power upon animpregnable basis, and secured it till his death. 

At the present moment he occupied the three posts of valet, statecouncillor, and finance minister. He dressed and undressed his master, read or talked him to sleep, called him in the morning, admitted thosewho were to have private audiences, and superintended all thearrangements of the household. The rest of the day was devoted to theenormous correspondence and affairs of administration which devolved uponhim as first minister of state and treasury. He was very ignorant. He hadno experience or acquirement in the arts either of war or peace, and hisearly education had been limited. Like his master, he spoke no tongue butSpanish, and he had no literature. He had prepossessing manners, a fluenttongue, a winning and benevolent disposition. His natural capacity foraffairs was considerable, and his tact was so perfect that he couldconverse face to face with statesmen; doctors, and generals uponcampaigns, theology, or jurisprudence, without betraying any remarkabledeficiency. He was very industrious, endeavoring to make up by hard studyfor his lack of general knowledge, and to sustain with credit the burthenof his daily functions. At the same time, by the King's desire, heappeared constantly at the frequent banquets, masquerades, tourneys andfestivities, for which Brussels at that epoch was remarkable. It was nowonder that his cheek was pale, and that he seemed dying of overwork. Hedischarged his duties cheerfully, however, for in the service of Philiphe knew no rest. "After God, " said Badovaro, "he knows no object save thefelicity of his master. " He was already, as a matter of course, veryrich, having been endowed by Philip with property to the amount oftwenty-six thousand dollars yearly, [at values of 1855] and the tide ofhis fortunes was still at the flood. 

Such were the two men, the master and the favorite, to whose hands thedestinies of the Netherlands were now entrusted. 

The Queen of Hungary had resigned the office of Regent of theNetherlands, as has been seen, on the occasion of the Emperor'sabdication. She was a woman of masculine character, a great huntressbefore the Lord, a celebrated horsewoman, a worthy descendant of the LadyMary of Burgundy. Notwithstanding all the fine phrases exchanged betweenherself and the eloquent Maas, at the great ceremony of the 25th ofOctober, she was, in reality, much detested in the provinces, and sherepaid their aversion with abhorrence. "I could not live among thesepeople, " she wrote to the Emperor, but a few weeks before the abdication, "even as a private person, for it would be impossible for me to do myduty towards God and my prince. As to governing them, I take God towitness that the task is so abhorrent to me, that I would rather earn mydaily bread by labor than attempt it. " She added, that a woman of fiftyyears of age, who had served during twenty-five of them, had a right torepose, and that she was moreover "too old to recommence and learn her A, B, C. " The Emperor, who had always respected her for the fidelity withwhich she had carried out his designs, knew that it was hopeless tooppose her retreat. As for Philip, he hated his aunt, and she hatedhim--although, both at the epoch of the abdication and subsequently, hewas desirous that she should administer the government. 

The new Regent was to be the Duke of Savoy. This wandering andadventurous potentate had attached himself to Philip's fortunes, and hadbeen received by the King with as much favor as he had ever enjoyed atthe hands of the Emperor. Emanuel Philibert of Savoy, then abouttwenty-six or seven years of age, was the son of the late unfortunateduke, by Donna Beatrice of Portugal, sister of the Empress. He was thenephew of Charles, and first cousin to Philip. The partiality of theEmperor for his mother was well known, but the fidelity with which thefamily had followed the imperial cause had been productive of nothing butdisaster to the duke. He had been ruined in fortune, stripped of all hisdignities and possessions. His son's only inheritance was his sword. Theyoung Prince of Piedmont, as he was commonly called in his youth; soughtthe camp of the Emperor, and was received with distinguished favor. Herose rapidly in the military service. Acting always upon his favoritemotto, "Spoliatis arma supersunt, " he had determined, if possible, tocarve his way to glory, to wealth, and even to his hereditary estates, byhis sword alone. War was not only his passion, but his trade. Every oneof his campaigns was a speculation, and he had long derived asatisfactory income by purchasing distinguished prisoners of war at a lowprice from the soldiers who had captured them, and were ignorant of theirrank, and by ransoming them afterwards at an immense advance. This sortof traffic in men was frequent in that age, and was considered perfectlyhonorable. Marshal Strozzi, Count Mansfeld, and other professionalsoldiers, derived their main income from the system. They were naturallyinclined, therefore, to look impatiently upon a state of peace as anunnatural condition of affairs which cut off all the profits of theirparticular branch of industry, and condemned them both to idleness andpoverty. The Duke of Savoy had become one of the most experienced andsuccessful commanders of the age, and an especial favorite with theEmperor. He had served with Alva in the campaigns against the Protestantsof Germany, and in other important fields. War being his element, heconsidered peace as undesirable, although he could recognize itsexistence. A truce he held, however, to be a senseless parodox, unworthyof the slightest regard. An armistice, such as was concluded on theFebruary following the abdication, was, in his opinion, only to be turnedto account by dealing insidious and unsuspected blows at the enemy, someportion of whose population might repose confidence in the plighted faithof monarchs and plenipotentiaries. He had a show of reason for hispolitical and military morality, for he only chose to execute the evilwhich had been practised upon himself. His father had been beggared, hismother had died of spite and despair, he had himself been reduced fromthe rank of a sovereign to that of a mercenary soldier, by spoliationsmade in time of truce. He was reputed a man of very decided abilities, and was distinguished for headlong bravery. His rashness and personaldaring were thought the only drawbacks to his high character as acommander. He had many accomplishments. He spoke Latin, French, Spanish, and Italian with equal fluency, was celebrated for his attachment to thefine arts, and wrote much and with great elegance. Such had beenPhilibert of Savoy, the pauper nephew of the powerful Emperor, theadventurous and vagrant cousin of the lofty Philip, a prince without apeople, a duke without a dukedom; with no hope but in warfare, with norevenue but rapine; the image, in person, of a bold and manly soldier, small, but graceful and athletic, martial in bearing, "wearing his swordunder his arm like a corporal, " because an internal malady made a beltinconvenient, and ready to turn to swift account every chance which a newseries of campaigns might open to him. With his new salary as governor, his pensions, and the remains of his possessions in Nice and Piedmont, hehad now the splendid annual income of one hundred thousand crowns, andwas sure to spend it all. 

It had been the desire of Charles to smooth the commencement of Philip'spath. He had for this purpose made a vigorous effort to undo, as it were, the whole work of his reign, to suspend the operation of his wholepolitical system. The Emperor and conqueror, who had been warring all hislifetime, had attempted, as the last act of his reign, to improvise apeace. But it was not so easy to arrange a pacification of Europe asdramatically as he desired, in order that he might gather his robes abouthim, and allow the curtain to fall upon his eventful history in a grandhush of decorum and quiet. During the autumn and winter of 1555, hostilities had been virtually suspended, and languid negotiationsensued. For several months armies confronted each other without engaging, and diplomatists fenced among themselves without any palpable result. Atlast the peace commissioners, who had been assembled at Vaucelles sincethe beginning of the year 1556, signed a treaty of truce rather than ofpeace, upon the 5th of February. It was to be an armistice of five years, both by land and sea, for France, Spain, Flanders, and Italy, throughoutall the dominions of the French and Spanish monarchs. The Pope wasexpressly included in the truce, which was signed on the part of Franceby Admiral Coligny and Sebastian l'Aubespine; on that of Spain, by Countde Lalain, Philibert de Bruxelles, Simon Renard, and Jean BaptisteSciceio, a jurisconsult of Cremona. During the precious month ofDecember, however, the Pope had concluded with the French monarch atreaty, by which this solemn armistice was rendered an egregious farce. While Henry's plenipotentiaries had been plighting their faith to thoseof Philip, it had been arranged that France should sustain, by subsidiesand armies, the scheme upon which Paul was bent, to drive the Spaniardsentirely out of the Italian peninsula. The king was to aid the pontiff, and, in return, was to carve thrones for his own younger children out ofthe confiscated realms of Philip. When was France ever slow to sweep uponItaly with such a hope? How could the ever-glowing rivalry of Valois andHabsburg fail to burst into a general conflagration, while the venerablevicegerent of Christ stood thus beside them with his fan in his hand?

For a brief breathing space, however, the news of the pacificationoccasioned much joy in the provinces. They rejoiced even in a temporarycessation of that long series of campaigns from which they couldcertainly derive no advantage, and in which their part was to furnishmoney, soldiers, and battlefields, without prospect of benefit from anyvictory, however brilliant, or any treaty, however elaborate. Manufacturing, agricultural and commercial provinces, filled to the fullwith industrial life, could not but be injured by being converted intoperpetual camps. All was joy in the Netherlands, while at Antwerp, thegreat commercial metropolis of the provinces and of Europe, the rapturewas unbounded. Oxen were roasted whole in the public squares; thestreets, soon to be empurpled with the best blood of her citizens, ranred with wine; a hundred triumphal arches adorned the pathway of Philipas he came thither; and a profusion of flowers, although it was February, were strewn before his feet. Such was his greeting in the light-heartedcity, but the countenance was more than usually sullen with which thesovereign received these demonstrations of pleasure. It was thought bymany that Philip had been really disappointed in the conclusion of thearmistice, that he was inspired with a spark of that martial ambition forwhich his panegyrists gave him credit, and that knowing full well theimprobability of a long suspension of hostilities, he was even eager forthe chance of conquest which their resumption would afford him. Thesecret treaty of the Pope was of course not so secret but that the hollowintention of the contracting parties to the truce of Vaucelles werethoroughly suspected; intentions which certainly went far to justify themaxims and the practice of the new governor-general of the Netherlandsupon the subject of armistices. 

Philip, understanding his position, was revolving renewed militaryprojects while his subjects were ringing merry bells and lightingbonfires in the Netherlands. These schemes, which were to be carried outin the immediate future, caused, however, a temporary delay in the greatpurpose to which he was to devote his life. 

The Emperor had always desired to regard the Netherlands as a whole, andhe hated the antiquated charters and obstinate privileges whichinterfered with his ideas of symmetry. Two great machines, the court ofMechlin and the inquisition, would effectually simplify and assimilateall these irregular and heterogeneous rights. The civil tribunal was toannihilate all diversities in their laws by a general cassation of theirconstitutions, and the ecclesiastical court was to burn out alldifferences in their religious faith. Between two such millstones it wasthought that the Netherlands might be crushed into uniformity. Philipsucceeded to these traditions. The father had never sufficient leisure tocarry out all his schemes, but it seemed probable that the son would be aworthy successor, at least in all which concerned the religious part ofhis system. One of the earliest measures of his reign was to re-enact thedread edict of 1550. This he did by the express advice of the Bishop ofArras who represented to him the expediency of making use of thepopularity of his father's name, to sustain the horrible system resolvedupon. As Charles was the author of the edict, it could be always arguedthat nothing new was introduced; that burning, hanging, and drowning forreligious differences constituted a part of the national institutions;that they had received the sanction of the wise Emperor, and had beensustained by the sagacity of past generations. Nothing could have beenmore subtle, as the event proved, than this advice. Innumerable were theappeals made in subsequent years, upon this subject, to the patriotismand the conservative sentiments of the Netherlanders. Repeatedly theywere summoned to maintain the inquisition, on the ground that it had beensubmitted to by their ancestors, and that no change had been made byPhilip, who desired only to maintain church and crown in the authoritywhich they had enjoyed in the days of his father of very laudable memory. 

Nevertheless, the King's military plans seemed to interfere for themoment with this cherished object. He seemed to swerve, at starting, frompursuing the goal which he was only to abandon with life. The edict of1550 was re-enacted and confirmed, and all office-holders were commandedfaithfully to enforce it upon pain of immediate dismissal. Nevertheless, it was not vigorously carried into effect any where. It was openlyresisted in Holland, its proclamation was flatly refused in Antwerp, andrepudiated throughout Brabant. It was strange that such disobedienceshould be tolerated, but the King wanted money. He was willing to refrainfor a season from exasperating the provinces by fresh religiouspersecution at the moment when he was endeavoring to extort every pennywhich it was possible to wring from their purses. 

The joy, therefore, with which the pacification had been hailed by thepeople was far from an agreeable spectacle to the King. The provinceswould expect that the forces which had been maintained at their expenseduring the war would be disbanded, whereas he had no intention ofdisbanding them. As the truce was sure to be temporary, he had nodisposition to diminish his available resources for a war which might berenewed at any moment. To maintain the existing military establishment inthe Netherlands, a large sum of money was required, for the pay was verymuch in arrear. The king had made a statement to the provincial estatesupon this subject, but the matter was kept secret during the negotiationswith France. The way had thus been paved for the "Request" or "Bede, "which he now made to the estates assembled at Brussels, in the spring of1556. It was to consist of a tax of one per cent. (the hundredth penny)upon all real estate, and of two per cent. Upon all merchandise; to becollected in three payments. The request, in so far as the imposition ofthe proposed tax was concerned, was refused by Flanders, Brabant, Holland, and all the other important provinces, but as usual, a moderate, even a generous, commutation in money was offered by the estates. Thiswas finally accepted by Philip, after he had become convinced that atthis moment, when he was contemplating a war with France, it would beextremely impolitic to insist upon the tax. The publication of the trucein Italy had been long delayed, and the first infractions which itsuffered were committed in that country. The arts of politicians; theschemes of individual ambition, united with the short-lived militaryardor of Philip to place the monarch in an eminently false position, thatof hostility to the Pope. As was unavoidable, the secret treaty ofDecember acted as an immediate dissolvent to the truce of February. 

Great was the indignation of Paul Caraffa, when that truce was firstcommunicated to him by the Cardinal de Tournon, on the part of the FrenchGovernment. Notwithstanding the protestations of France that the secretleague was still binding, the pontiff complained that he was likely to beabandoned to his own resources, and to be left single-handed to contendwith the vast power of Spain. 

Pope Paul IV. , of the house of Caraffa, was, in position, the well-knowncounterpart of the Emperor Charles. At the very moment when the conquerorand autocrat was exchanging crown for cowl, and the proudest throne ofthe universe for a cell, this aged monk, as weary of scientific andreligious seclusion as Charles of pomp and power, had abdicated hisscholastic pre-eminence, and exchanged his rosary for the keys and sword. A pontifical Faustus, he had become disgusted with the results of a lifeof study and abnegation, and immediately upon his election appeared to beglowing with mundane passions, and inspired by the fiercest ambition of awarrior. He had rushed from the cloister as eagerly as Charles had soughtit. He panted for the tempests of the great external world as earnestlyas the conqueror who had so long ridden upon the whirlwind of humanaffairs sighed for a haven of repose. None of his predecessors had beenmore despotic, more belligerent, more disposed to elevate and strengthenthe temporal power of Rome. In the inquisition he saw the grand machineby which this purpose could be accomplished, and yet found himself for aperiod the antagonist of Philip. The single circumstance would have beensufficient, had other proofs been wanting, to make manifest that the partwhich he had chosen to play was above his genius. Had his capacity beenat all commensurate with his ambition, he might have deeply influencedthe fate of the world; but fortunately no wizard's charm came to the aidof Paul Caraffa, and the triple-crowned monk sat upon the pontificalthrone, a fierce, peevish, querulous, and quarrelsome dotard; the preyand the tool of his vigorous enemies and his intriguing relations. Hishatred of Spain and Spaniards was unbounded. He raved at them as"heretics, schismatics, accursed of God, the spawn of Jews and Moors, thevery dregs of the earth. " To play upon such insane passions was notdifficult, and a skilful artist stood ever ready to strike the chordsthus vibrating with age and fury. The master spirit and principalmischief-maker of the papal court was the well-known Cardinal Caraffa, once a wild and dissolute soldier, nephew to the Pope. He inflamed theanger of the pontiff by his representations, that the rival house ofColonna, sustained by the Duke of Alva, now viceroy of Naples, and by thewhole Spanish power, thus relieved from the fear of French hostilities, would be free to wreak its vengeance upon their family. It was determinedthat the court of France should be held by the secret league. Moreover, the Pope had been expressly included in the treaty of Vaucelles, althoughthe troops of Spain had already assumed a hostile attitude in the southof Italy. The Cardinal was for immediately proceeding to Paris, there toexcite the sympathy of the French monarch for the situation of himselfand his uncle. An immediate rupture between France and Spain, are-kindling of the war flames from one end of Europe to the other, werenecessary to save the credit and the interests of the Caraffas. Cardinalde Tournon, not desirous of so sudden a termination to the pacificrelations between his, country and Spain, succeeded in detaining him alittle longer in Rome. --He remained, but not in idleness. The restlessintriguer had already formed close relations with the most importantpersonage in France, Diana of Poitiers. --This venerable courtesan, to theenjoyment of whose charms Henry had succeeded, with the other regalpossessions, on the death of his father, was won by the flatteries of thewily Caraffa, and by the assiduities of the Guise family. The best andmost sagacious statesmen, the Constable, and the Admiral, were in favorof peace, for they knew the condition of the kingdom. The Duke of Guiseand the Cardinal Lorraine were for a rupture, for they hoped to increasetheir family influence by war. Coligny had signed the treaty ofVaucelles, and wished to maintain it, but the influence of the Catholicparty was in the ascendant. The result was to embroil the Catholic Kingagainst the Pope and against themselves. The queen was as favorablyinclined as the mistress to listen to Caraffa, for Catherine de Mediciwas desirous that her cousin, Marshal Strozzi, should have honorable andprofitable employment in some fresh Italian campaigns. 

In the mean time an accident favored the designs of the papal court. Anopen quarrel with Spain resulted from an insignificant circumstance. TheSpanish ambassador at Rome was in the habit of leaving the city veryoften, at an early hour in the morning, upon shooting excursions, and hadlong enjoyed the privilege of ordering the gates to be opened for him athis pleasure. By accident or design, he was refused permission upon oneoccasion to pass through the gate as usual. Unwilling to lose his day'ssport, and enraged at what he considered an indignity, his excellency, bythe aid of his attendants, attacked and beat the guard, mastered them, made his way out of the city, and pursued his morning's amusement. ThePope was furious, Caraffa artfully inflamed his anger. The envoy wasrefused an audience, which he desired, for the sake of offeringexplanations, and the train being thus laid, it was thought that theright moment had arrived for applying the firebrand. The Cardinal went toParis post haste. In his audience of the King, he represented that hisHoliness had placed implicit reliance upon his secret treaty with hismajesty, that the recently concluded truce with Spain left the pontiff atthe mercy of the Spaniard, that the Duke of Alva had already drawn thesword, that the Pope had long since done himself the pleasure and thehonor of appointing the French monarch protector of the papal chair ingeneral, and of the Caraffa family in particular, and that the moment hadarrived for claiming the benefit of that protection. He assured him, moreover, as by full papal authority, that in respecting the recent trucewith Spain, his majesty would violate both human and divine law. Reasonand justice required him to defend the pontiff, now that the Spaniardswere about to profit by the interval of truce to take measures for hisdetriment. Moreover, as the Pope was included in the truce of Vaucelles, he could not be abandoned without a violation of that treaty itself. --Thearts and arguments of the Cardinal proved successful; the war wasresolved upon in favor of the Pope. The Cardinal, by virtue of powersreceived and brought with him from his holiness, absolved the King fromall obligation to keep his faith with Spain. He also gave him adispensation from the duty of prefacing hostilities by a declaration ofwar. Strozzi was sent at once into Italy, with some hastily collectedtroops, while the Duke of Guise waited to organize a regular army. 

The mischief being thus fairly afoot, and war let loose again uponEurope, the Cardinal made a public entry into Paris, as legate of thePope. The populace crowded about his mule, as he rode at the head of astately procession through the streets. All were anxious to receive abenediction from the holy man who had come so far to represent thesuccessor of St. Peter, and to enlist the efforts of all true believersin his cause. He appeared to answer the entreaties of the superstitiousrabble with fervent blessings, while the friends who were nearest himwere aware that nothing but gibes and sarcasms were falling from hislips. "Let us fool these poor creatures to their heart's content, sincethey will be fools, " he muttered; smiling the while upon thembenignantly, as became his holy office. Such were the materials of thisnew combination; such was the fuel with which this new blaze was lightedand maintained. Thus were the great powers of the earth--Spain, France, England, and the Papacy embroiled, and the nations embattled against eachother for several years. The preceding pages show how much nationalinterests, or principles; were concerned in the struggle thus commenced, in which thousands were to shed their life-blood, and millions to bereduced from peace and comfort to suffer all the misery which famine andrapine can inflict. It would no doubt have increased the hilarity ofCaraffa, as he made his triumphant entry into Paris, could the idea havebeen suggested to his mind that the sentiments, or the welfare of thepeople throughout the great states now involved in his meshes, could haveany possible bearing upon the question of peace or wax. The world wasgoverned by other influences. The wiles of a cardinal--the arts of aconcubine--the snipe-shooting of an ambassador--the speculations of asoldier of fortune--the ill temper of a monk--the mutual venom of Italianhouses--above all, the perpetual rivalry of the two great historicalfamilies who owned the greater part of Europe between them as theirprivate property--such were the wheels on which rolled the destiny ofChristendom. Compared to these, what were great moral and politicalideas, the plans of statesmen, the hopes of nations? Time was soon toshow. Meanwhile, government continued to be administered exclusively forthe benefit of the governors. Meanwhile, a petty war for paltry motiveswas to precede the great spectacle which was to prove to Europe thatprinciples and peoples still existed, and that a phlegmatic nation ofmerchants and manufacturers could defy the powers of the universe, andrisk all their blood and treasure, generation after generation, in asacred cause. 

It does not belong to our purpose to narrate the details of the campaignin Italy; neither is this war of politics and chicane of any greatinterest at the present day. To the military minds of their age, thescientific duel which now took place upon a large scale, between two suchcelebrated captains as the Dukes of Guise and Alva, was no doubt esteemedthe most important of spectacles; but the progress of mankind in the artof slaughter has stripped so antiquated an exhibition of most of itsinterest, even in a technical point of view. Not much satisfaction couldbe derived from watching an old-fashioned game of war, in which theparties sat down before each other so tranquilly, and picked up pieceafter piece, castle after castle, city after city, with such scientificdeliberation as to make it evident that, in the opinion of thecommanders, war was the only serious business to be done in the world;that it was not to be done in a hurry, nor contrary to rule, and thatwhen a general had a good job upon his hands he ought to know hisprofession much too thoroughly, to hasten through it before he saw hisway clear to another. From the point of time, at the close of the year1556, when that well-trained but not very successful soldier, Strozzi, crossed the Alps, down to the autumn of the following year, when the Dukeof Alva made his peace with the Pope, there was hardly a pitched battle, and scarcely an event of striking interest. Alva, as usual, brought hisdilatory policy to bear upon his adversary with great effect. He had nointention, he observed to a friend, to stake the whole kingdom of Naplesagainst a brocaded coat of the Duke of Guise. Moreover, he had been sentto the war, as Ruy Gomez informed the Venetian ambassador, "with a bridlein his mouth. " Philip, sorely troubled in his mind at finding himself inso strange a position as this hostile attitude to the Church, hadearnestly interrogated all the doctors and theologians with whom hehabitually took counsel, whether this war with the Pope would not work aforfeiture of his title of the Most Catholic King. The Bishop of Arrasand the favorite both disapproved of the war, and encouraged, with alltheir influence, the pacific inclinations of the monarch. The doctorswere, to be sure, of opinion that Philip, having acted in Italy only inself-defence, and for the protection of his states, ought not to beanxious as to his continued right to the title on which he valued himselfso highly. Nevertheless, such ponderings and misgivings could not buthave the effect of hampering the actions of Alva. That general chafedinwardly at what he considered his own contemptible position. At the sametime, he enraged the Duke of Guise still more deeply by the forcedcalmness of his proceedings. Fortresses were reduced, towns taken, oneafter another, with the most provoking deliberation, while his distractedadversary in vain strove to defy, or to delude him, into trying thechances of a stricken field. The battle of Saint Quentin, the narrativeof which belongs to our subject, and will soon occupy our attention, atlast decided the Italian operations. Egmont's brilliant triumph inPicardy rendered a victory in Italy superfluous, and placed in Alva'shand the power of commanding the issue of his own campaign. The Duke ofGuise was recalled to defend the French frontier, which the bravery ofthe Flemish hero had imperilled, and the Pope was left to make the bestpeace which he could. All was now prosperous and smiling, and thecampaign closed with a highly original and entertaining exhibition. Thepontiff's puerile ambition, sustained by the intrigues of his nephew, hadinvolved the French monarch in a war which was contrary to his interestsand inclination. Paul now found his ally too sorely beset to afford himthat protection upon which he had relied, when he commenced, in hisdotage, his career as a warrior. He was, therefore, only desirous ofdeserting his friend, and of relieving himself from his uncomfortablepredicament, by making a treaty with his catholic majesty upon the bestterms which he could obtain. The King of France, who had gone to war onlyfor the sake of his holiness, was to be left to fight his own battles, while the Pope was to make his peace with all the world. The result was adesirable one for Philip. Alva was accordingly instructed to afford theholy father a decorous and appropriate opportunity for carrying out hiswishes. The victorious general was apprized that his master desired nofruit from his commanding attitude in Italy and the victory of SaintQuentin, save a full pardon from the Pope for maintaining even adefensive war against him. An amicable siege of Rome was accordinglycommenced, in the course of which an assault or "camiciata" on the holycity, was arranged for the night of the 26th August, 1557. The pontiffagreed to be taken by surprise--while Alva, through what was to appearonly a superabundance of his habitual discretion, was to draw off histroops at the very moment when the victorious assault was to be made. Theimminent danger to the holy city and to his own sacred person thusfurnishing the pontiff with an excuse for abandoning his own cause, aswell as that of his ally the Duke of Alva was allowed, in the name of hismaster and himself; to make submission to the Church and his peace withRome. The Spanish general, with secret indignation and disgust, wascompelled to humor the vanity of a peevish but imperious old man. Negotiations were commenced, and so skilfully had the Duke played hisgame during the spring and summer, that when he was admitted to kiss thePope's toe, he was able to bring a hundred Italian towns in his hand, asa peace-offering to his holiness. These he now restored, with apparenthumility and inward curses, upon the condition that the fortificationsshould be razed, and the French alliance absolutely renounced. Thus didthe fanaticism of Philip reverse the relative position of himself and hisantagonist. Thus was the vanquished pontiff allowed almost to dictateterms to the victorious general. The king who could thus humble himselfto a dotard, while he made himself the scourge of his subjects, deservedthat the bull of excommunication which had been prepared should have beenfulminated. He, at least, was capable of feeling the scathing effects ofsuch anathemas. 

The Duke of Guise, having been dismissed with the pontiff's assurancethat he had done little for the interests of his sovereign, less for theprotection of the Church, and least of all for his own reputation, setforth with all speed for Civita Vecchia, to do what he could upon theFlemish frontier to atone for his inglorious campaign in Italy. Thetreaty between the Pope and the Duke of Alva was signed on the 14thSeptember (1557), and the Spanish general retired for the winter toMilan. Cardinal Caraffa was removed from the French court to that ofMadrid, there to spin new schemes for the embroilment of nations and theadvancement of his own family. Very little glory was gained by any of thecombatants in this campaign. Spain, France, nor Paul IV. , not one of themcame out of the Italian contest in better condition than that in whichthey entered upon it. In fact all were losers. France had made aninglorious retreat, the Pope a ludicrous capitulation, and the onlyvictorious party, the King of Spain, had, during the summer, conceded toCosmo de Medici the sovereignty of Sienna. Had Venice shown morecordiality towards Philip, and more disposition to sustain his policy, itis probable that the Republic would have secured the prize which thusfell to the share of Cosmo. That astute and unprincipled potentate, whocould throw his net so well in troubled water, had successfully duped allparties, Spain, France, and Rome. The man who had not only notparticipated in the contest, but who had kept all parties and all warfareaway from his borders, was the only individual in Italy who gainedterritorial advantage from the war. 

To avoid interrupting the continuity of the narrative, the Spanishcampaign has been briefly sketched until the autumn of 1557, at whichperiod the treaty between the Pope and Philip was concluded. It is nownecessary to go back to the close of the preceding year. 

Simultaneously with the descent of the French troops upon Italy, hostilities had broken out upon the Flemish border. The pains of theEmperor in covering the smouldering embers of national animosities soprecipitately, and with a view rather to scenic effect than to adeliberate and well-considered result, were thus set at nought, andwithin a year from the day of his abdication, hostilities were reopenedfrom the Tiber to the German Ocean. The blame of first violating thetruce of Vaucelles was laid by each party upon the other with equaljustice, for there can be but little doubt that the reproach justlybelonged to both. Both had been equally faithless in their professions ofamity. Both were equally responsible for the scenes of war, plunder, andmisery, which again were desolating the fairest regions of Christendom. 

At the time when the French court had resolved to concede to the wishesof the Caraffa family, Admiral Coligny, who had been appointed governorof Picardy, had received orders to make a foray upon the frontier ofFlanders. Before the formal annunciation of hostilities, it was thoughtdesirable to reap all the advantage possible from the perfidy which hadbeen resolved upon. 

It happened that a certain banker of Lucca, an ancient gambler anddebauchee, whom evil courses had reduced from affluence to penury, hadtaken up his abode upon a hill overlooking the city of Douay. Here he hadbuilt himself a hermit's cell. Clad in sackcloth, with a rosary at hiswaist, he was accustomed to beg his bread from door to door. His garb wasall, however, which he possessed of sanctity, and he had passed his timein contemplating the weak points in the defences of the city with muchmore minuteness than those in his own heart. Upon the breaking out ofhostilities in Italy, the instincts of his old profession had suggestedto him that a good speculation might be made in Flanders, by turning toaccount as a spy the observations which he had made in his character of ahermit. He sought an interview with Coligny, and laid his propositionsbefore him. The noble Admiral hesitated, for his sentiments were moreelevated than those of many of his contemporaries. He had, moreover, himself negotiated and signed the truce with Spain, and he shrank fromviolating it with his own hand, before a declaration of war. Still he wasaware that a French army was on its way to attack the Spaniards in Italy;he was under instructions to take the earliest advantage which hisposition upon the frontier might offer him; he knew that both theory andpractice authorized a general, in that age, to break his fast, even intime of truce, if a tempting morsel should present itself; and, aboveall, he thoroughly understood the character of his nearest antagonist, the new governor of the Netherlands, Philibert of Savoy, whom he knew tobe the most unscrupulous chieftain in Europe. These considerationsdecided him to take advantage of the hermit-banker's communication. 

A day was accordingly fixed, at which, under the guidance of thisnewly-acquired ally, a surprise should be attempted by the French forces, and the unsuspecting city of Douay given over to the pillage of a brutalsoldiery. The time appointed was the night of Epiphany, upon occasion ofwhich festival, it was thought that the inhabitants, overcome with sleepand wassail, might be easily overpowered. (6th January, 1557. ) The plotwas a good plot, but the Admiral of France was destined to be foiled byan old woman. This person, apparently the only creature awake in thetown, perceived the danger, ran shrieking through the streets, alarmedthe citizens while it was yet time, and thus prevented the attack. Coligny, disappointed in his plan, recompensed his soldiers by a suddenonslaught upon Lens in Arthois, which he sacked and then levelled withthe ground. Such was the wretched condition of frontier cities, standing, even in time of peace, with the ground undermined beneath them, andexisting every moment, as it were, upon the brink of explosion. 

Hostilities having been thus fairly commenced, the French government wasin some embarrassment. The Duke of Guise, with the most available forcesof the kingdom, having crossed the Alps, it became necessary forthwith tocollect another army. The place of rendezvous appointed was Pierrepoint, where an army of eighteen thousand infantry and five thousand horse wereassembled early in the spring. In the mean time, Philip finding the warfairly afoot, had crossed to England for the purpose (exactly incontravention of all his marriage stipulations) of cajoling his wife andbrowbeating her ministers into a participation in his war with France. This was easily accomplished. The English nation found themselvesaccordingly engaged in a contest with which they had no concern, which, as the event proved, was very much against their interests, and in whichthe moving cause for their entanglement was the devotion of a weak, bad, ferocious woman, for a husband who hated her. A herald sent from Englandarrived in France, disguised, and was presented to King Henry at Rheims. Here, dropping on one knee, he recited a list of complaints against hismajesty, on behalf of the English Queen, all of them fabricated orexaggerated for the occasion, and none of them furnishing even a decorouspretext for the war which was now formally declared in consequence. TheFrench monarch expressed his regret and surprise that the firm andamicable relations secured by treaty between the two countries shouldthus, without sufficient cause, be violated. In accepting the wager ofwarfare thus forced upon him, he bade the herald, Norris, inform hismistress that her messenger was treated with courtesy only because herepresented a lady, and that, had he come from a king, the language withwhich he would have been greeted would have befitted the perfidymanifested on the occasion. God would punish this shameless violation offaith, and this wanton interruption to the friendship of two greatnations. With this the herald was dismissed from the royal presence, buttreated with great distinction, conducted to the hotel of the Englishambassador, and presented, on the part of the French sovereign with achain of gold. 

Philip had despatched Ruy Gomez to Spain for the purpose of providingways and means, while he was himself occupied with the same task inEngland. He stayed there three months. During this time, he "did more, "says a Spanish contemporary, "than any one could have believed possiblewith that proud and indomitable nation. He caused them to declare waragainst France with fire and sword, by sea and land. " Hostilities havingbeen thus chivalrously and formally established, the Queen sent an armyof eight thousand men, cavalry, infantry, and pioneers, who, "all clad inblue uniform, " commanded by Lords Pembroke and Clinton, with the threesons of the Earl of Northumberland, and officered by many other scions ofEngland's aristocracy, disembarked at Calais, and shortly afterwardsjoined the camp before Saint Quentin. 

Philip meantime had left England, and with more bustle and activity thanwas usual with him, had given directions for organizing at once aconsiderable army. It was composed mainly of troops belonging to theNetherlands, with the addition of some German auxiliaries. Thirty-fivethousand foot and twelve thousand horse had, by the middle of July, advanced through the province of Namur, and were assembled at Givet underthe Duke of Savoy, who, as Governor-General of the Netherlands, held thechief command. All the most eminent grandees of the provinces, Orange, Aerschot, Berlaymont, Meghen, Brederode, were present with the troops, but the life and soul of the army, upon this memorable occasion, was theCount of Egmont. 

Lamoral, Count of Egmont, Prince of Gavere, was now in the thirty-sixthyear of his age, in the very noon of that brilliant life which wasdestined to be so soon and so fatally overshadowed. Not one of the darkclouds, which were in the future to accumulate around him, had yet rolledabove his horizon. Young, noble, wealthy, handsome, valiant, he saw nothreatening phantom in the future, and caught eagerly at the goldenopportunity, which the present placed within his grasp, of winning freshlaurels on a wider and more fruitful field than any in which he hadhitherto been a reaper. The campaign about to take place was likely to bean imposing, if not an important one, and could not fail to be attractiveto a noble of so ardent and showy a character as Egmont. If there were nolofty principles or extensive interests to be contended for, as therecertainly were not, there was yet much that was stately and exciting tothe imagination in the warfare which had been so deliberately andpompously arranged. The contending armies, although of moderate size, were composed of picked troops, and were commanded by the flower ofEurope's chivalry. Kings, princes, and the most illustrious paladins ofChristendom, were arming for the great tournament, to which they had beensummoned by herald and trumpet; and the Batavian hero, without a crown oreven a country, but with as lofty a lineage as many anointed sovereignscould boast, was ambitious to distinguish himself in the proud array. 

Upon the north-western edge of the narrow peninsula of North Holland, washed by the stormy waters of the German Ocean, were the ancient castle, town, and lordship, whence Egmont derived his family name, and the titleby which he was most familiarly known. He was supposed to trace hisdescent, through a line of chivalrous champions and crusaders, up to thepagan kings of the most ancient of existing Teutonic races. The eighthcentury names of the Frisian Radbold and Adgild among his ancestors werethought to denote the antiquity of a house whose lustre had beenincreased in later times by the splendor of its alliances. His father, united to Francoise de Luxemburg, Princess of Gavere, had acquired bythis marriage, and transmitted to his posterity, many of the proudesttitles and richest estates of Flanders. Of the three children whosurvived him, the only daughter was afterwards united to the Count ofVaudemont, and became mother of Louise de Vaudemont, queen of the Frenchmonarch, Henry the Third. 

Of his two sons, Charles, the elder, had died young and unmarried, leaving all the estates and titles of the family to his brother. Lamoral, born in 1522, was in early youth a page of the Emperor. When old enoughto bear arms he demanded and obtained permission to follow the career ofhis adventurous sovereign. He served his apprenticeship as a soldier inthe stormy expedition to Barbary, where, in his nineteenth year, hecommanded a troop of light horse, and distinguished himself under theEmperor's eye for his courage and devotion, doing the duty not only of agallant commander but of a hardy soldier. Returning, unscathed by thewar, flood, or tempest of that memorable enterprise, he reached hiscountry by the way of Corsica, Genoa, and Lorraine, and was three yearsafterwards united (in the year 1545) to Sabina of Bavaria, sister ofFrederick, Elector Palatine. The nuptials had taken place at Spiers, andfew royal weddings could have been more brilliant. The Emperor, hisbrother Ferdinand King of the Romans, with the Archduke Maximilian, allthe imperial electors, and a concourse of the principal nobles of theempire, were present on the occasion been at the Emperor's side duringthe unlucky siege of Metz; in 1554 he had been sent at the head of asplendid embassy to England, to solicit for Philip the hand of MaryTudor, and had witnessed the marriage in Winchester Cathedral, the sameyear. Although one branch of his house had, in past times, arrived at thesovereignty of Gueldres, and another had acquired the great estates andtitles of Buren, which had recently passed, by intermarriage with theheiress, into the possession of the Prince of Orange, yet the Prince ofGavere, Count of Egmont, was the chief of a race which yielded to none ofthe great Batavian or Flemish families in antiquity, wealth, or power. Personally, he was distinguished for his bravery, and although he was notyet the idol of the camp, which he was destined to become, nor had yetcommanded in chief on any important occasion, he was accounted one of thefive principal generals in the Spanish service. Eager for generaladmiration, he was at the same time haughty and presumptuous, attemptingto combine the characters of an arrogant magnate and a popular chieftain. Terrible and sudden in his wrath, he was yet of inordinate vanity, andwas easily led by those who understood his weakness. With a limitededucation, and a slender capacity for all affairs except those relatingto the camp, he was destined to be as vacillating and incompetent as astatesman, as he was prompt and fortunately audacious in the field. Asplendid soldier, his evil stars had destined him to tread, as apolitician, a dark and dangerous path, in which not even genius, caution, and integrity could ensure success, but in which rashness alternatingwith hesitation, and credulity with violence, could not fail to bringruin. Such was Count Egmont, as he took his place at the-head of theking's cavalry in the summer of 1557. 

The early operations of the Duke of Savoy were at first intended todeceive the enemy. The army, after advancing as far into Picardy as thetown of Vervins, which they burned and pillaged, made a demonstrationwith their whole force upon the city of Guise. This, however, was but afeint, by which attention was directed and forces drawn off from SaintQuentin, which was to be the real point of attack In the mean time, theConstable of France, Montmorency, arrived upon the 28th July (1557), totake command of the French troops. He was accompanied by the Marechal deSaint Andre and by Admiral Coligny. The most illustrious names of France, whether for station or valor, were in the officers' list of this selectarmy. Nevers and Montpensier, Enghien and Conde, Vendome andRochefoucauld, were already there, and now the Constable and the Admiralcame to add the strength of their experience and lofty reputation tosustain the courage of the troops. The French were at Pierrepoint, a postbetween Champagne and Picardy, and in its neighborhood. The Spanish armywas at Vervins, and threatening Guise. It had been the opinion in Francethat the enemy's intention was to invade Champagne, and the Duc deNevers, governor of that province, had made a disposition of his forcessuitable for such a contingency. It was the conviction of Montmorency, however, that Picardy was to be the quarter really attacked, and thatSaint Quentin, which was the most important point at which the enemy'sprogress, by that route, towards Paris could be arrested, was in imminentdanger. The Constable's opinion was soon confirmed by advices received byColigny. The enemy's army, he was informed, after remaining three daysbefore Guise, had withdrawn from that point, and had invested SaintQuentin with their whole force. 

This wealthy and prosperous city stood upon an elevation rising from theriver Somme. It was surrounded by very extensive suburbs, ornamented withorchards and gardens, and including within their limits large tracts of ahighly cultivated soil. Three sides of the place were covered by a lake, thirty yards in width, very deep at some points, in others, ratherresembling a morass, and extending on the Flemish side a half mile beyondthe city. The inhabitants were thriving and industrious; many of themanufacturers and merchants were very rich, for it was a place of muchtraffic and commercial importance. 

Teligny, son-in-law of the Admiral, was in the city with a detachment ofthe Dauphin's regiment; Captain Brueuil was commandant of the town. Bothinformed Coligny of the imminent peril in which they stood. Theyrepresented the urgent necessity of immediate reinforcements both of menand supplies. The city, as the Admiral well knew, was in no condition tostand a siege by such an army, and dire were the consequences which wouldfollow the downfall of so important a place. It was still practicable, they wrote, to introduce succor, but every day diminished the possibilityof affording effectual relief. Coligny was not the man to let the grassgrow under his feet, after such an appeal in behalf of the principalplace in his government. The safety of France was dependent upon that ofSt. Quentin. The bulwark overthrown, Paris was within the next stride ofan adventurous enemy. The Admiral instantly set out, upon the 2d ofAugust, with strong reinforcements. It was too late. The Englishauxiliaries, under Lords Pembroke, Clinton, and Grey, had, in the meantime, effected their junction with the Duke of Savoy, and appeared in thecamp before St. Quentin. The route, by which it had been hoped that themuch needed succor could be introduced, was thus occupied and renderedimpracticable. The Admiral, however, in consequence of the urgent natureof the letters received from Brueuil and Teligny, had outstripped, in hisanxiety, the movements of his troops. He reached the city, almost aloneand unattended. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of his officers, he hadlistened to no voice save the desperate entreaties of the besiegedgarrison, and had flown before his army. He now shut himself up in thecity, determined to effect its deliverance by means of his skill andexperience, or, at least, to share its fate. As the gates closed uponColigny, the road was blocked up for his advancing troops. 

A few days were passed in making ineffectual sorties, ordered by Colignyfor the sake of reconnoitring the country, and of discovering the mostpracticable means of introducing supplies. The Constable, meantime, whohad advanced with his army to La Fore, was not idle. He kept up dailycommunications with the beleagured Admiral, and was determined, ifpossible, to relieve the city. There was, however, a constant successionof disappointments. Moreover, the brave but indiscreet Teligny, whocommanded during a temporary illness of the Admiral, saw fit, againstexpress orders, to make an imprudent sortie. He paid the penalty of hisrashness with his life. He was rescued by the Admiral in person, who, atimminent hazard, brought back the unfortunate officer covered withwounds, into the city, there to die at his father's feet, imploringforgiveness for his disobedience. Meantime the garrison was daily growingweaker. Coligny sent out of the city all useless consumers, quartered allthe women in the cathedral and other churches, where they were locked in, lest their terror and their tears should weaken the courage of thegarrison; and did all in his power to strengthen the defences of thecity, and sustain the resolution of the inhabitants. Affairs were growingdesperate. It seemed plain that the important city must soon fall, andwith it most probably Paris. One of the suburbs was already in the handsof the enemy. At last Coligny discovered a route by which he believed itto be still possible to introduce reinforcements. He communicated theresults of his observations to the Constable. Upon one side of the citythe lake, or morass, was traversed by a few difficult and narrowpathways, mostly under water, and by a running stream which could only bepassed in boats. The Constable, in consequence of this informationreceived from Coligny, set out from La Fere upon the 8th of August, withfour thousand infantry and two thousand horse. Halting his troops at thevillage of Essigny, he advanced in person to the edge of the morass, inorder to reconnoitre the ground and prepare his plans. The result was adetermination to attempt the introduction of men and supplies into thetown by the mode suggested. Leaving his troops drawn up in battle array, he returned to La Fere for the remainder of his army, and to complete hispreparations. Coligny in the mean time was to provide boats for crossingthe stream. Upon the 10th August, which was the festival of St. Laurence, the Constable advanced with four pieces of heavy artillery, fourculverines, and four lighter pieces, and arrived at nine o'clock in themorning near the Faubourg d'Isle, which was already in possession of theSpanish troops. The whole army of the Constable consisted of twelvethousand German, with fifteen companies of French infantry; making in allsome sixteen thousand foot, with five thousand cavalry in addition. TheDuke of Savoy's army lay upon the same side of the town, widely extended, and stretching beyond the river and the morass. Montmorency's project wasto be executed in full view of the enemy. Fourteen companies of Spaniardswere stationed in the faubourg. Two companies had been pushed forward asfar as a water-mill, which lay in the pathway of the advancing Constable. These soldiers stood their ground for a moment, but soon retreated, whilea cannonade was suddenly opened by the French upon the quarters of theDuke of Savoy. The Duke's tent was torn to pieces, and he had barely timeto hurry on his cuirass, and to take refuge with Count Egmont. TheConstable, hastening to turn this temporary advantage to account at once, commenced the transportation of his troops across the morass. Theenterprise was, however, not destined to be fortunate. The number ofboats which had been provided was very inadequate; moreover they werevery small, and each as it left the shore was consequently so crowdedwith soldiers that it was in danger of being swamped. Several wereoverturned, and the men perished. It was found also that the oppositebank was steep and dangerous. Many who had crossed the river were unableto effect a landing, while those who escaped drowning in the water losttheir way in the devious and impracticable paths, or perished miserablyin the treacherous quagmires. Very few effected their entrance into thetown, but among them was Andelot, brother of Coligny, with five hundredfollowers. Meantime, a council of officers was held in Egmont's tent. Opinions were undecided as to the course to be pursued under thecircumstances. Should an engagement be risked, or should the Constable, who had but indifferently accomplished his project and had introduced butan insignificant number of troops into the city, be allowed to withdrawwith the rest of his army? The fiery vehemence of Egmont carried allbefore it. Here was an opportunity to measure arms at advantage with thegreat captain of the age. To relinquish the prize, which the fortune ofwar had now placed within reach of their valor, was a thought not to beentertained. Here was the great Constable Montmorency, attended byprinces of the royal blood, the proudest of the nobility, the very crownand flower of the chivalry of France, and followed by an army of herbravest troops. On a desperate venture he had placed himself within theirgrasp. Should he go thence alive and unmolested? The moral effect ofdestroying such an army would be greater than if it were twice its actualstrength. It would be dealing a blow at the very heart of France, fromwhich she could not recover. Was the opportunity to be resigned without astruggle of laying at the feet of Philip, in this his first campaignsince his accession to his father's realms, a prize worthy of theproudest hour of the Emperor's reign? The eloquence of the impetuousBatavian was irresistible, and it was determined to cut off theConstable's retreat. 

Three miles from the Faubourg d'Isle, to which that general had nowadvanced, was a narrow pass or defile, between steep and closely hanginghills. While advancing through this ravine in the morning, the Constablehad observed that the enemy might have it in their power to intercept hisreturn at that point. He had therefore left the Rhinegrave, with hiscompany of mounted carabineers, to guard the passage. Being ready tocommence his retreat, he now sent forward the Due de Nevers, with fourcompanies of cavalry to strengthen that important position, which hefeared might be inadequately guarded. The act of caution came too late. This was the fatal point which the quick glance of Egmont had at oncedetected. As Nevers reached the spot, two thousand of the enemy's cavalryrode through and occupied the narrow passage. Inflamed by mortificationand despair, Nevers would have at once charged those troops, althoughoutnumbering his own by nearly, four to one. His officers restrained himwith difficulty, recalling to his memory the peremptory orders which hehad received from the Constable to guard the passage, but on no accountto hazard an engagement, until sustained by the body of the army. It wasa case in which rashness would have been the best discretion. Theheadlong charge which the Duke had been about to make, might possiblyhave cleared the path and have extricated the army, provided theConstable had followed up the movement by a rapid advance upon his part. As it was, the passage was soon blocked up by freshly advancing bodies ofSpanish and Flemish cavalry, while Nevers slowly and reluctantly fellback upon the Prince of Conde, who was stationed with the light horse atthe mill where the first skirmish had taken place. They were soon joinedby the Constable, with the main body of the army. The whole French forcenow commenced its retrograde movement. It was, however, but too evidentthat they were enveloped. As they approached the fatal pass through whichlay their only road to La Fire, and which was now in complete possessionof the enemy, the signal of assault was given by Count Egmont. Thatgeneral himself, at the head of two thousand light horse, led the chargeupon the left flank. The other side was assaulted by the Dukes Eric andHenry of Brunswick, each with a thousand heavy dragoons, sustained byCount Horn, at the head of a regiment of mounted gendarmerie. Mansfeld, Lalain, Hoogstraaten; and Vilain, at the same time made a furious attackupon the front. The French cavalry wavered with the shock so vigorouslygiven. The camp followers, sutlers, and pedlers, panic-struck, at oncefled helter-skelter, and in their precipitate retreat, carried confusionand dismay throughout all the ranks of the army. The rout was sudden andtotal. The onset and the victory were simultaneous, Nevers riding througha hollow with some companies of cavalry, in the hope of making a detourand presenting a new front to the enemy, was overwhelmed at once by theretreating French and their furious pursuers. The day was lost, retreathardly possible, yet, by a daring and desperate effort, the Duke, accompanied by a handful of followers, cut his way through the enemy andeffected his escape. The cavalry had been broken at the first onset andnearly destroyed. A portion of the infantry still held firm, andattempted to continue their retreat. Some pieces of artillery, however, now opened upon them, and before they reached Essigny, the whole army wascompletely annihilated. The defeat was absolute. Half the French troopsactually engaged in the enterprise, lost their lives upon the field. Theremainder of the army was captured or utterly disorganized. When Neversreviewed, at Laon, the wreck of the Constable's whole force, he foundsome thirteen hundred French and three hundred German cavalry, with fourcompanies of French infantry remaining out of fifteen, and four thousandGerman foot remaining of twelve thousand. Of twenty-one or two thousandremarkably fine and well-appointed troops, all but six thousand had beenkilled or made prisoners within an hour. The Constable himself, with awound in the groin, was a captive. The Duke of Enghien, after behavingwith brilliant valor, and many times rallying the troops, was shotthrough the body, and brought into the enemy's camp only to expire. TheDue de Montpensier, the Marshal de Saint Andre, the Due de Loggieville, Prince Ludovic of Mantua, the Baron Corton, la Roche du Mayne, theRhinegrave, the Counts de Rochefoucauld, d'Aubigni, de Rochefort, allwere taken. The Due de Nevers, the Prince of Conde, with a few others, escaped; although so absolute was the conviction that such an escape wasimpossible, that it was not believed by the victorious army. When Neverssent a trumpet, after the battle, to the Duke of Savoy, for the purposeof negotiating concerning the prisoners, the trumpeter was pronounced animpostor, and the Duke's letter a forgery; nor was it till after thewhole field had been diligently searched for his dead body withoutsuccess, that Nevers could persuade the conquerors that he was still inexistence. 

Of Philip's army but fifty lost their lives. Lewis of Brederode wassmothered in his armor; and the two counts Spiegelberg and Count Waldeckwere also killed; besides these, no officer of distinction fell. All theFrench standards and all their artillery but two pieces were taken, andplaced before the King, who the next day came into the camp before SaintQuentin. The prisoners of distinction were likewise presented to him inlong procession. Rarely had a monarch of Spain enjoyed a more signaltriumph than this which Philip now owed to the gallantry and promptnessof Count Egmont. 

While the King stood reviewing the spoils of victory, a light horseman ofDon Henrico Manrique's regiment approached, and presented him with asword. "I am the man, may it please your Majesty, " said the trooper, "whotook the Constable; here is his sword; may your Majesty be pleased togive me something to eat in my house. " "I promise it, " replied Philip;upon which the soldier kissed his Majesty's hand and retired. It was thecustom universally recognized in that day, that the king was the king'scaptive, and the general the general's, but that the man, whether soldieror officer, who took the commander-in-chief, was entitled to ten thousandducats. Upon this occasion the Constable was the prisoner of Philip, supposed to command his own army in person. A certain Spanish CaptainValenzuela, however, disputed the soldier's claim to the Constable'ssword. The trooper advanced at once to the Constable, who stood therewith the rest of the illustrious prisoners. "Your excellency is aChristian, " said he; "please to declare upon your conscience and thefaith of a cavalier, whether 't was I that took you prisoner. It need notsurprise your excellency that I am but a soldier, since with soldiers hisMajesty must wage his wars. " "Certainly, " replied the Constable, "youtook me and took my horse, and I gave you my sword. My word, however, Ipledged to Captain Valenzuela. " It appearing, however, that the custom ofSpain did not recognize a pledge given to any one but the actual captor, it was arranged that the soldier should give two thousand of his tenthousand ducats to the captain. Thus the dispute ended. 

Such was the brilliant victory of Saint Quentin, worthy to be placed inthe same list with the world-renowned combats of Creqy and Agincourt. Like those battles, also, it derives its main interest from the personalcharacter of the leader, while it seems to have been hallowed by thetender emotions which sprang from his subsequent fate. The victory wasbut a happy move in a winning game. The players were kings, and thepeople were stakes--not parties. It was a chivalrous display in a warwhich was waged without honorable purpose, and in which no single loftysentiment was involved. The Flemish frontier was, however, saved for thetime from the misery which was now to be inflicted upon the Frenchborder. This was sufficient to cause the victory to be hailed asrapturously by the people as by the troops. From that day forth the nameof the brave Hollander was like the sound of a trumpet to the army. "Egmont and Saint Quentin" rang through every mouth to the furthestextremity of Philip's realms. A deadly blow was struck to the very heartof France. The fruits of all the victories of Francis and Henry withered. The battle, with others which were to follow it, won by the same hand, were soon to compel the signature of the most disastrous treaty which hadever disgraced the history of France. 

The fame and power of the Constable faded--his misfortunes and captivityfell like a blight upon the ancient glory of the house ofMontmorency--his enemies destroyed his influence and hispopularity--while the degradation of the kingdom was simultaneous withthe downfall of his illustrious name. On the other hand, the exultationof Philip was as keen as his cold and stony nature would permit. Themagnificent palace-convent of the Escurial, dedicated to the saint onwhose festival the battle had been fought, and built in the shape of thegridiron, on which that martyr had suffered, was soon afterwards erectedin pious commemoration of the event. Such was the celebration of thevictory. The reward reserved for the victor was to be recorded on a laterpage of history. 

The coldness and caution, not to say the pusillanimity of Philip, prevented him from seizing the golden fruits of his triumph. FerdinandGonzaga wished the blow to be followed up by an immediate march uponParis. --Such was also the feeling of all the distinguished soldiers ofthe age. It was unquestionably the opinion, and would have been the deed, of Charles, had he been on the field of Saint Quentin, crippled as hewas, in the place of his son. He could not conceal his rage andmortification when he found that Paris had not fallen, and is said tohave refused to read the despatches which recorded that the event had notbeen consummated. There was certainly little of the conqueror in Philip'snature; nothing which would have led him to violate the safest principlesof strategy. He was not the man to follow up enthusiastically the blowwhich had been struck; Saint Quentin, still untaken, although defended bybut eight hundred soldiers, could not be left behind him; Nevers wasstill in his front, and although it was notorious that he commanded onlythe wreck of an army, yet a new one might be collected, perhaps, in timeto embarrass the triumphant march to Paris. Out of his superabundantdiscretion, accordingly, Philip refused to advance till Saint Quentinshould be reduced. 

Although nearly driven to despair by the total overthrow of the French inthe recent action, Coligny still held bravely out, being well aware thatevery day by which the siege could be protracted was of advantage to hiscountry. Again he made fresh attempts to introduce men into the city. Afisherman showed him a submerged path, covered several feet deep withwater, through which he succeeded in bringing one hundred and fiftyunarmed and half-drowned soldiers into the place. His garrison consistedbarely of eight hundred men, but the siege was still sustained, mainly byhis courage and sagacity, and by the spirit of his brother Andelot. Thecompany of cavalry, belonging to the Dauphin's regiment, had behavedbadly, and even with cowardice, since the death of their commanderTeligny. The citizens were naturally weary and impatient of the siege. Mining and countermining continued till the 21st August. A steadycannonade was then maintained until the 27th. Upon that day, elevenbreaches having been made in the walls, a simultaneous assault wasordered at four of them. The citizens were stationed upon the walls, the soldiers in the breaches. There was a short but sanguinary contest, the garrison resisting with uncommon bravery. Suddenly an entrance waseffected through a tower which had been thought sufficiently strong, andwhich had been left unguarded. Coligny, rushing to the spot, engaged theenemy almost single-handed. He was soon overpowered, being attended onlyby four men and a page, was made a prisoner by a soldier named FranciscoDiaz, and conducted through one of the subterranean mines into thepresence of the Duke of Savoy, from whom the captor received ten thousandducats in exchange for the Admiral's sword. The fighting still continuedwith great determination in the streets, the brave Andelot resisting tothe last. He was, however, at last overpowered, and taken prisoner. Philip, who had, as usual, arrived in the trenches by noon, armed incomplete harness, with a page carrying his helmet, was met by theintelligence that the city of Saint Quentin was his own. 

To a horrible carnage succeeded a sack and a conflagration still morehorrible. In every house entered during the first day, every human beingwas butchered. The sack lasted all that day and the whole of thefollowing, till the night of the 28th. There was not a soldier who didnot obtain an ample share of plunder, and some individuals succeeded ingetting possession of two, three, and even twelve thousand ducats each. The women were not generally outraged, but they were stripped almostentirely naked, lest they should conceal treasure which belonged to theirconquerors, and they were slashed in the face with knives, partly insport, partly as a punishment for not giving up property which was not intheir possession. The soldiers even cut off the arms of many among thesewretched women, and then turned them loose, maimed and naked, into theblazing streets; for the town, on the 28th, was fired in a hundredplaces, and was now one general conflagration. The streets were alreadystrewn with the corpses of the butchered garrison and citizens; while thesurvivors were now burned in their houses. Human heads, limbs, andtrunks, were mingled among the bricks and rafters of the houses, whichwere falling on every side. The fire lasted day and night, without anattempt being made to extinguish it; while the soldiers dashed likedevils through flame and smoke in search of booty. Bearing lightedtorches, they descended into every subterrranean vault and receptacle, ofwhich there were many in the town, and in every one of which they hopedto discover hidden treasure. The work of killing, plundering, and burninglasted nearly three days and nights. The streets, meanwhile, wereencumbered with heaps of corpses, not a single one of which had beenburied since the capture of the town. The remains of nearly all the ablebodied male population, dismembered, gnawed by dogs or blackened by fire, polluted the midsummer air meantime, the women had been again driven intothe cathedral, where they had housed during the siege, and where they nowcrouched together in trembling expectation of their fate. ' On the 29thAugust, at two o'clock in the afternoon, Philip issued an order thatevery woman, without an exception, should be driven out of the city intothe French territory. Saint Quentin, which seventy years before had beena Flemish town, was to be re-annexed, and not a single man, woman, orchild who could speak the French language was to remain another hour inthe place. The tongues of the men had been effectually silenced. Thewomen, to the number of three thousand five hundred, were now compelledto leave the cathedral and the city. Some were in a starving condition;others had been desperately wounded; all, as they passed through theruinous streets of what had been their home, were compelled to tread uponthe unburied remains of their fathers, husbands, or brethren. To none ofthese miserable creatures remained a living protector--hardly even a deadbody which could be recognized; and thus the ghastly procession of morethan three thousand women, many with gaping wounds in the face, many withtheir arms cut off and festering, of all ranks and ages, some numberingmore than ninety years, bareheaded, with grey hair streaming upon theirshoulders; others with nursing infants in their arms, all escorted by acompany of heavy-armed troopers, left forever their native city. All madethe dismal journey upon foot, save that carts were allowed to transportthe children between the ages of two and six years. The desolation anddepopulation were now complete. "I wandered through the place, gazing atall this, " says a Spanish soldier who was present, and kept a diary ofall which occurred, "and it seemed to me that it was another destructionof Jerusalem. What most struck me was to find not a single denizen of thetown left, who was or who dared to call himself French. How vain andtransitory, thought I, are the things of this world! Six days ago whatriches were in the city, and now remains not one stone upon another. "

The expulsion of the women had been accomplished by the express commandof Philip, who moreover had made no effort to stay the work of carnage, pillage, and conflagration. The pious King had not forgotten, however, his duty to the saints. As soon as the fire had broken out, he had sentto the cathedral, whence he had caused the body of Saint Quentin to beremoved and placed in the royal tent. Here an altar, was arranged, uponone side of which was placed the coffin of that holy personage, and uponthe other the head of the "glorious Saint Gregory" (whoever that gloriousindividual may have been in life), together with many other relicsbrought from the church. Within the sacred enclosure many masses weresaid daily, while all this devil's work was going on without. The saintwho had been buried for centuries was comfortably housed and guarded bythe monarch, while dogs were gnawing the carcases of the freshly-slainmen of Saint Quentin, and troopers were driving into perpetual exile itsdesolate and mutilated women. 

The most distinguished captives upon this occasion were, of course, Coligny and his brother. Andelot was, however, fortunate enough to makehis escape that night under the edge of the tent in which he wasconfined. The Admiral was taken to Antwerp. Here he lay for many weekssick with a fever. Upon his recovery, having no better pastime, he fellto reading the Scriptures. The result was his conversion to Calvinism;and the world shudders yet at the fate in which that conversion involvedhim. 

Saint Quentin being thus reduced, Philip was not more disposed to pushhis fortune. The time was now wasted in the siege of severalcomparatively unimportant places, so that the fruits of Egmont's valorwere not yet allowed to ripen. Early in September Le Catelet was taken. On the 12th of the same month the citadel of Ham yielded, after receivingtwo thousand shots from Philip's artillery, while Nojon, Chanly, and someother places of less importance, were burned to the ground. After allthis smoke and fire upon the frontier, productive of but slenderconsequences, Philip disbanded his army, and retired to Brussels. Hereached that city on the 12th October. The English returned to their owncountry. The campaign of 1557 was closed without a material result, andthe victory of Saint Quentin remained for a season barren. 

In the mean time the French were not idle. The army of the Constable hadbeen destroyed but the Duke de Guise, who had come post-haste from Italyafter hearing the news of Saint Quentin, was very willing to organizeanother. He was burning with impatience both to retrieve his ownreputation, which had suffered some little damage by his recent Italiancampaign, and to profit by the captivity of his fallen rival theConstable. During the time occupied by the languid and dilatoryproceedings of Philip in the autumn, the Duke had accordingly recruitedin France and Germany a considerable army. In January (1558) he was readyto take the field. It had been determined in the French cabinet, however, not to attempt to win back the places which they had lost in Picardy, butto carry the war into the territory of the ally. It was fated thatEngland should bear all the losses, and Philip appropriate all the gainand glory, which resulted from their united exertions. It was the war ofthe Queen's husband, with which the Queen's people had no concern, but inwhich the last trophies of the Black Prince were to be forfeited. On thefirst January, 1558, the Duc de Guise appeared before Calais. The MarshalStrozzi had previously made an expedition, in disguise, to examine theplace. The result of his examination was that the garrison was weak, andthat it relied too much upon the citadel. After a tremendous cannonade, which lasted a week, and was heard in Antwerp, the city was taken byassault. Thus the key to the great Norman portal of France, thetime-honored key which England had worn at her girdle since the eventfulday of Crecy, was at last taken from her. Calais had been originally wonafter a siege which had lasted a twelvemonth, had been held two hundredand ten years, and was now lost in seven days. Seven days more, and tenthousand discharges from thirty-five great guns sufficed for thereduction of Guines. Thus the last vestige of English dominion, the lastsubstantial pretext of the English sovereign to wear the title and thelilies of France, was lost forever. King Henry visited Calais, whichafter two centuries of estrangement had now become a French town again, appointed Paul de Thermes governor of the place, and then returned toParis to celebrate soon afterwards the marriage of the Dauphin with theniece of the Guises, Mary, Queen of Scots. 

These events, together with the brief winter campaign of the Duke, whichhad raised for an instant the drooping head of France, were destinedbefore long to give a new face to affairs, while it secured theascendancy of the Catholic party in the kingdom. Disastrous eclipse hadcome over the house of Montmorency and Coligny, while the star of Guise, brilliant with the conquest of Calais, now culminated to the zenith. 

It was at this period that the memorable interview between the twoecclesiastics, the Bishop of Arras and the Cardinal de Lorraine, tookplace at Peronne. From this central point commenced the weaving of thatwide-spread scheme, in which the fate of millions was to be involved. TheDuchess Christina de Lorraine, cousin of Philip, had accompanied him toSaint Quentin. Permission had been obtained by the Duc de Guise and hisbrother, the Cardinal, to visit her at Peronne. The Duchess wasaccompanied by the Bishop of Arras, and the consequence was a full andsecret negotiation between the two priests. It may be supposed thatPhilip's short-lived military ardor had already exhausted itself. He hadmistaken his vocation, and already recognized the false position in whichhe was placed. He was contending against the monarch in whom he mightfind the surest ally against the arch enemy of both kingdoms, and of theworld. The French monarch held heresy in horror, while, for himself, Philip had already decided upon his life's mission. 

The crafty Bishop was more than a match for the vain and ambitiousCardinal. That prelate was assured that Philip considered the captivityof Coligny and Montmorency a special dispensation of Providence, whilethe tutelar genius of France, notwithstanding the reverses sustained bythat kingdom, was still preserved. The Cardinal and his brother, it wassuggested, now held in their hands the destiny of the kingdom, and ofEurope. The interests of both nations, of religion, and of humanity, madeit imperative upon them to put an end to this unnatural war, in orderthat the two monarchs might unite hand and heart for the extirpation ofheresy. That hydra-headed monster had already extended its coils throughFrance, while its pestilential breath was now wafted into Flanders fromthe German as well as the French border. Philip placed full reliance uponthe wisdom and discretion of the Cardinal. It was necessary that thesenegotiations should for the present remain a profound secret; but in themean time a peace ought to be concluded with as little delay as possible;a result which, it was affirmed, was as heartily desired by Philip as itcould be by Henry. The Bishop was soon aware of the impression which hisartful suggestions had produced. The Cardinal, inspired by the flatterythus freely administered, as well as by the promptings of his ownambition, lent a willing ear to the Bishop's plans. Thus was laid thefoundation of a vast scheme, which time was to complete. A crusade withthe whole strength of the French and Spanish crowns, was resolved uponagainst their own subjects. The Bishop's task was accomplished. TheCardinal returned to France, determined to effect a peace with Spain. Hewas convinced that the glory of his house was to be infinitely enhanced, and its power impregnably established, by a cordial co-operation withPhilip in his dark schemes against religion and humanity. Thenegotiations were kept, however, profoundly secret. A new campaign andfresh humiliations were to precede the acceptance by France of the peacewhich was thus proffered. 

Hostile operations were renewed soon after the interview at Peronne. TheDuke of Guise, who had procured five thousand cavalry and fourteenthousand infantry in Germany, now, at the desire of the King, undertookan enterprise against Thionville, a city of importance and great strengthin Luxemburg, upon the river Moselle. It was defended by Peter deQuarebbe, a gentleman of Louvain, with a garrison of eighteen hundredmen. On the 5th June, thirty-five pieces of artillery commenced the work;the mining and countermining-continuing seventeen days; on the 22nd theassault was made, and the garrison capitulated immediately afterwards. Itwas a siege conducted in a regular and business-like way, but the detailspossess no interest. It was, however, signalized by the death of one ofthe eminent adventurers of the age, Marshal Strozzi. This brave, butalways unlucky soldier was slain by a musket ball while assisting theDuke of Guise--whose arm was, at that instant, resting upon hisshoulder--to point a gun at the fortress. 

After the fall of Thionville, the Due de Guise, for a short time, contemplated the siege of the city of Luxemburg, but contented himselfwith the reduction of the unimportant places of Vireton and Arlon. Herehe loitered seventeen days, making no exertions to follow up the successwhich had attended him at the opening of the campaign. The good fortuneof the French was now neutralized by the same languor which had markedthe movements of Philip after the victory of Saint Quentin. The time, which might have been usefully employed in following up his success, wasnow wasted by the Duke in trivial business, or in absolute torpor. Thismay have been the result of a treacherous understanding with Spain, andthe first fruits of the interview at Peronne. Whatever the cause, however, the immediate consequences were disaster to the French nation, and humiliation to the crown. 

It had been the plan of the French cabinet that Marshal de Thermes, who, upon the capture of Calais, had been appointed governor of the city, should take advantage of his position as soon as possible. Havingassembled an army of some eight thousand foot and fifteen hundred horse, partly Gascons and partly Germans, he was accordingly directed to ravagethe neighboring country, particularly the county of Saint Pol. In themean time, the Due de Guise, having reduced the cities on the southernfrontier, was to move in a northerly direction, make a junction with theMarshal, and thus extend a barrier along the whole frontier of theNetherlands. 

De Therlries set forth from Calais, in the beginning of June, with hisnewly-organized army. Passing by Gravelines and Bourbourg, he arrivedbefore Dunkerk on the 2d of July. The city, which was without a garrison, opened negotiations, during the pendency of which it was taken by assaultand pillaged. The town of Saint Winochsberg shared the same fate. DeThermes, who was a martyr to the gout, was obliged at this pointtemporarily to resign the command to d'Estonteville, a ferocious soldier, who led the predatory army as far as Niewport, burning, killing, ravishing, plundering, as they went. Meantime Philip, who was atBrussels, had directed the Duke of Savoy to oppose the Due de Guise withan army which had been hastily collected and organized at Maubeuge, inthe province of Namur. He now desired, if possible, to attack and cut offthe forces of De Thermes before he should extend the hand to Guise, ormake good his retreat to Calais. 

Flushed with victory over defenceless peasants, laden with the spoils ofsacked and burning towns, the army of De Thermes was already on itshomeward march. It was the moment for a sudden and daring blow. Whose armshould deal it? What general in Philip's army possessed the requisitepromptness, and felicitous audacity; who, but the most brilliant ofcavalry officers, the bold and rapid hero of St. Quentin? Egmont, inobedience to the King's command, threw himself at once into the field. Hehastily collected all the available forces in the neighborhood. These, with drafts from the Duke of Savoy's army, and with detachments underMarshal Bigonicourt from the garrisons of Saint Omer, Bethune, Aire, andBourbourg, soon amounted to ten thousand foot and two thousand horse. Hisnumbers were still further swollen by large bands of peasantry, both menand women, maddened by their recent injuries, and thirsting forvengeance. With these troops the energetic chieftain took up his positiondirectly in the path of the French army. Determined to destroy De Thermeswith all his force, or to sacrifice himself, he posted his army atGravelines, a small town lying near the sea-shore, and about midwaybetween Calais and Dunkerk. The French general was putting the finishingtouch to his expedition by completing the conflagration at Dunkerk, andwas moving homeward, when he became aware of the lion in his path. Although suffering from severe sickness, he mounted his horse andpersonally conducted his army to Gravelines. Here he found his progresscompletely arrested. On that night, which was the 12th July, he held acouncil of officers. It was determined to refuse the combat offered, and, if possible, to escape at low tide along the sands toward Calais. Thenext morning he crossed the river Aa, below Gravelines. Egmont, who wasnot the man, on that occasion at least, to build a golden bridge for aflying enemy, crossed the same stream just above the town, and drew uphis whole force in battle array. De Thermes could no longer avoid theconflict thus resolutely forced upon him. Courage was now his only. Counsellor. Being not materially outnumbered by his adversaries, he had, at least, an even chance of cutting his way through all obstacles, and ofsaving his army and his treasure. The sea was on his right hand, the Aabehind him, the enemy in front. He piled his baggage and wagons so as toform a barricade upon his left, and placed his artillery, consisting offour culverines and three falconeta, in front. Behind these he drew uphis cavalry, supported at each side by the Gascons, and placed his Frenchand German infantry in the rear. 

Egmont, on the other hand, divided his cavalry into five squadrons. Threeof light horse were placed in advance for the first assault--the centrecommanded by himself, the two wings by Count Pontenals and HenricoHenriquez. The black hussars of Lazarus Schwendi and the Flemishgendarmes came next. Behind these was the infantry, divided into threenations, Spanish, German, and Flemish, and respectively commanded byCarvajal, Monchausen, and Bignicourt. Egmont, having characteristicallyselected the post of danger in the very front of battle for himself, could no longer restrain his impatience. "The foe is ours already, " heshouted; "follow me, all who love their fatherland:" With that he setspurs to his horse, and having his own regiment well in hand, dashed uponthe enemy. The Gascons received the charge with coolness, and under coverof a murderous fire from the artillery in front, which mowed down theforemost ranks of their assailants-sustained the whole weight of thefirst onset without flinching. Egmont's horse was shot under him at thecommencement of the action. Mounting another, he again cheered hiscavalry to the attack. The Gascons still maintained an unwavering front, and fought with characteristic ferocity. The courage of despair inflamedthe French, the hope of a brilliant and conclusive victory excited theSpaniards and Flemings. It was a wild, hand to hand conflict--general andsoldier, cavalier and pikeman, lancer and musketeer, mingled together inone dark, confused, and struggling mass, foot to foot, breast to breast, horse to horse-a fierce, tumultuous battle on the sands, worthy thefitful pencil of the national painter, Wouvermans. For a long time it wasdoubtful on which side victory was to incline, but at last ten Englishvessels unexpectedly appeared in the offing, and ranging up soonafterwards as close to the share as was possible, opened their fire uponthe still unbroken lines of the French. The ships were too distant, thedanger of injuring friend as well as foe too imminent, to allow of theirexerting any important influence upon the result. The spirit of the enemywas broken, however, by this attack upon their seaward side, which theyhad thought impregnable. At the same time, too, a detachment of Germancavalry which had been directed by Egmont to make their way under thedowns to the southward, now succeeded in turning their left flank. Egmont, profiting by their confusion, charged them again with redoubledvigor. The fate of the day was decided. The French cavalry wavered, broketheir ranks, and in their flight carried dismay throughout the wholearmy. The rout was total; horse and foot; French, Gascon, and German fledfrom the field together. Fifteen hundred fell in the action, as many morewere driven into the sea, while great numbers were torn to pieces by theexasperated peasants, who now eagerly washed out their recent injuries inthe blood of the dispersed, wandering, and wounded soldiers. The army ofDe Thermes was totally destroyed, and with it, the last hope of Francefor an honorable and equal negotiation. She was now at Philip's feet, sothat this brilliant cavalry action, although it has been surpassed inimportance by many others, in respect to the numbers of the combatantsand the principles involved in the contest, was still, in regard to theextent both of its immediate and its permanent results, one of the mostdecisive and striking which have ever been fought. The French armyengaged was annihilated. Marshal de Thermes, with a wound in the head, Senarpont, Annibault, Villefon, Morvilliers, Chanlis, and many others ofhigh rank were prisoners. The French monarch had not much heart to setabout the organization of another army; a task which he was now compelledto undertake. He was soon obliged to make the best terms which he could, and to consent to a treaty which was one of the most ruinous in thearchives of France. 

The Marshal de Thermes was severely censured for having remained so longat Dunkerk and in its neighborhood. He was condemned still more loudlyfor not having at least effected his escape beyond Gravelines, during thenight which preceded the contest. With regard to the last charge, however, it may well be doubted whether any nocturnal attempt would havebeen likely to escape the vigilance of Egmont. With regard to his delayat Dunkerk, it was asserted that he had been instructed to await in thatplace the junction with the Due de Guise, which had been previouslyarranged. But for the criminal and, then, inexplicable languor whichcharacterized that commander's movements, after the capture ofThionville, the honor of France might still have been saved. 

Whatever might have been the faults of De Thermes or of Guise, therecould be little doubt as to the merit of Egmont. Thus within elevenmonths of the battle of Saint Quentin, had the Dutch hero gained anothervictory so decisive as to settle the fate of the war, and to elevate hissovereign to a position from which he might dictate the terms of atriumphant peace. The opening scenes of Philip's reign were rendered asbrilliant as the proudest days of the Emperor's career, while theprovinces were enraptured with the prospect of early peace. To whom, then, was the sacred debt of national and royal gratitude due but toLamoral of Egmont? His countrymen gladly recognized the claim. He becamethe idol of the army; the familiar hero of ballad and story; the mirrorof chivalry, and the god of popular worship. Throughout the Netherlandshe was hailed as the right hand of the fatherland, the saviour ofFlanders from devastation and outrage, the protector of the nation, thepillar of the throne. 

The victor gained many friends by his victory, and one enemy. Thebitterness of that foe was likely, in the future, to outweigh all theplaudits of his friends. The Duke of Alva had strongly advised againstgiving battle to De Thermes. He depreciated the triumph after it had beengained, by reflections upon the consequences which would have flowed, hada defeat been suffered instead. He even held this language to Egmonthimself after his return to Brussels. The conqueror, flushed with hisglory, was not inclined to digest the criticism, nor what he consideredthe venomous detraction of the Duke. More vain and arrogant than ever, hetreated his powerful Spanish rival with insolence, and answered hisobservations with angry sarcasms, even in the presence of the King. Alvawas not likely to forget the altercation, nor to forgive the triumph. 

There passed, naturally, much bitter censure and retort on both sides atcourt, between the friends and adherents of Egmont and those whosustained the party of his adversary. The battle of Gravelines was foughtover daily, amid increasing violence and recrimination, between Spaniardand Fleming, and the old international hatred flamed more fiercely thanever. Alva continued to censure the foolhardiness which had risked sovaluable an army on a single blow. Egmont's friends replied that it waseasy for foreigners, who had nothing at risk in the country, to look onwhile the fields of the Netherlands were laid waste, and the homes andhearths of an industrious population made desolate, by a brutal andrapacious soldiery. They who dwelt in the Provinces would be evergrateful to their preserver for the result. They had no eyes for thepicture which the Spanish party painted of an imaginary triumph of DeThermos and its effects. However the envious might cavil, now that theblow had been struck, the popular heart remained warm as ever, andrefused to throw down the idol which had so recently been set up. 

CHAPTER III. 1558-1559

 Secret negotiations for peace--Two fresh armies assembled, but inactive--Negotiations at Cercamp--Death of Mary Tudor--Treaty of Cateau Cambresis--Death of Henry II. --Policy of Catharine de Medici --Revelations by Henry II. To the Prince of Orange--Funeral of Charles V. In Brussels--Universal joy in the Netherlands at the restoration of peace--Organization of the government by Philip, and preparations for his departure--Appointment of Margaret of Parma as Regent of the Netherlands--Three councils--The consulta--The stadholders of the different provinces--Dissatisfaction caused by the foreign troops--Assembly of the Estates at Ghent to receive the parting instructions and farewell of the King--Speech of the Bishop of Arras--Request for three millions--Fierce denunciation of heresy on the part of Philip--Strenuous enforcement of the edicts commanded--Reply by the States of Arthois--Unexpected conditions-- Rage of the King--Similar conduct on the part of the other provinces--Remonstrance in the name of States--General against the foreign soldiery--Formal reply on the part of the crown--Departure of the King from the Netherlands--Autos--da--fe in Spain. 

The battle of Gravelines had decided the question. The intrigues of thetwo Cardinals at Peronne having been sustained by Egmont's victory, allparties were ready for a peace. King Henry was weary of the losing gamewhich he had so long been playing, Philip was anxious to relieve himselffrom his false position, and to concentrate his whole mind and thestrength of his kingdom upon his great enemy the Netherland heresy, whilethe Duke of Savoy felt that the time had at last arrived when an adroitdiplomacy might stand him in stead, and place him in the enjoyment ofthose rights which the sword had taken from him, and which his own swordhad done so much towards winning back. The sovereigns were inclined topeace, and as there had never been a national principle or instinct orinterest involved in the dispute, it was very certain that peace would bepopular every where, upon whatever terms it might be concluded. 

Montmorency and the Prince of Orange were respectively empowered to opensecret negotiations. The Constable entered upon the task with alacrity, because he felt that every day of his captivity was alike prejudicial tohis own welfare and the interests of his country. --The Guises, who hadquarrelled with the Duchess de Valentinois (Diane de Poitiers), were notyet powerful enough to resist the influence of the mistress; while, rather to baffle them than from any loftier reasons, that interest wasexerted in behalf of immediate peace. The Cardinal de Lorraine had by nomeans forgotten the eloquent arguments used by the Bishop of Arras; buthis brother, the Due de Guise, may be supposed to have desired somelittle opportunity of redeeming the credit of the kingdom, and to havedelayed the negotiations until his valor could secure a less inglorioustermination to the war. 

A fresh army had, in fact, been collected under his command, and wasalready organized at Pierrepoint. At the same time, Philip had assembleda large force, consisting of thirty thousand foot and fifteen thousandcavalry, with which he had himself taken the field, encamping towards themiddle of August upon the banks of the river Anthies, near the border ofPicardy. King Henry, on the other hand, had already arrived in the campat Pierrepoint, and had reviewed as imposing an army as had ever been atthe disposal of a French monarch. When drawn up in battle array itcovered a league and a half of ground, while three hours were required tomake its circuit on horseback. All this martial display was only foreffect. The two kings, at the head of their great armies, stood lookingat each other while the negotiations for, peace were proceeding. Anunimportant skirmish or two at the out-posts, unattended with loss oflife, were the only military results of these great preparations. Earlyin the autumn, all the troops were disbanded, while the commissioners ofboth crowns met in open congress at the abbey of Cercamp, near Cambray, by the middle of October. The envoys on the part of Philip were thePrince of Orange, the Duke of Alva, the Bishop of Arras, Ruy Gomez deSilva, the president Viglius; on that of the French monarch, theConstable, the Marshal de Saint Andre, the Cardinal de Lorraine, theBishop of Orleans, and Claude l'Aubespine. 

There were also envoys sent by the Queen of England, but as the disputeconcerning Calais was found to hamper the negotiations at Cercamp, theEnglish question was left to be settled by another congress, and was keptentirely separate from the arrangements concluded between France andSpain. 

The death of Queen Mary, on the 17th November, caused a temporarysuspension of the proceedings. After the widower, however, had made afruitless effort to obtain the hand of her successor, and had beenunequivocally repulsed, the commissioners again met in February, 1559, atCateau Cambresis. The English difficulty was now arranged by separatecommissioners, and on the third of April a treaty between France andSpain was concluded. 

By this important convention, both kings bound themselves to maintain theCatholic worship inviolate by all means in their power, and agreed thatan oecumenical council should at once assemble, to compose the religiousdifferences, and to extinguish the increasing heresy in both kingdoms. Furthermore, it was arranged that the conquests made by each countryduring the preceding eight years should be restored. Thus all the gainsof Francis and Henry were annulled by a single word, and the Duke ofSavoy converted, by a dash of the pen, from a landless soldier of fortuneinto a sovereign again. He was to receive back all his estates, and wasmoreover to marry Henry's sister Margaret, with a dowry of three hundredthousand crowns. Philip, on the other hand, now a second time a widower, was to espouse Henry's daughter Isabella, already betrothed to the InfantDon Carlos, and to receive with her a dowry of four hundred thousandcrowns. The restitutions were to be commenced by Henry, and to becompleted within three months. Philip was to restore his conquests in thecourse of a month afterwards. 

Most of the powers of Europe were included by both parties in thistreaty: the Pope, the Emperor, all the Electors, the republics of Venice, Genoa and Switzerland, the kingdoms of England, Scotland, Poland, Denmark, Sweden; the duchies of Ferrara, Savoy and Parma, besides otherinferior principalities. Nearly all Christendom, in short, was embracedin this most amicable compact, as if Philip were determined that, henceforth and forever, Calvinists and Mahometans, Turks and Flemings, should be his only enemies. 

The King of France was to select four hostages from among Philip'ssubjects, to accompany him to Paris as pledges for the execution of allthe terms of the treaty. The royal choice fell upon the Prince of Orange, the Duke of Alva, the Duke of Aerschot, and the Count of Egmont. 

Such was the treaty of Cateau Cambresis. Thus was a termination put to awar between France and Spain, which had been so wantonly undertaken. 

Marshal Monluc wrote that a treaty so disgraceful and disastrous hadnever before been ratified by a French monarch. It would have beendifficult to point to any one more unfortunate upon her previous annals;if any treaty can be called unfortunate, by which justice is done andwrongs repaired, even under coercion. The accumulated plunder of years, which was now disgorged by France, was equal in value to one third ofthat kingdom. One hundred and ninety-eight fortified towns weresurrendered, making, with other places of greater or less importance, atotal estimated by some writers as high as four hundred. The principalgainer was the Duke of Savoy, who, after so many years ofknight-errantry, had regained his duchy, and found himself thebrother-in-law of his ancient enemy. 

The well-known tragedy by which the solemnities of this pacification wereabruptly concluded in Paris, bore with it an impressive moral. Themonarch who, in violation of his plighted word and against the interestsof his nation and the world, had entered precipitately into a causelesswar, now lost his life in fictitious combat at the celebration of peace. On the tenth of July, Henry the Second died of the wound inflicted byMontgomery in the tournament held eleven days before. Of this weak andworthless prince, all that even his flatterers could favorably urge washis great fondness for war, as if a sanguinary propensity, even whenunaccompanied by a spark of military talent, were of itself a virtue. Yet, with his death the kingdom fell even into more pernicious hands, andthe fate of Christendom grew darker than ever. The dynasty of Diane dePoitiers was succeeded by that of Catharine de Medici; the courtesan gaveplace to the dowager; and France during the long and miserable period inwhich she lay bleeding in the grasp of the Italian she-wolf and herlitter of cowardly and sanguinary princes--might even lament the days ofHenry and his Diana. Charles the Ninth, Henry the Third, Francis ofAlencon, last of the Valois race--how large a portion of the fearful debtwhich has not yet been discharged by half a century of revolution andmassacre was of their accumulation. 

The Duchess of Valentinois had quarrelled latterly with the house ofGuise, and was disposed to favor Montmorency. The King, who was but atool in her hands, might possibly have been induced, had he lived, toregard Coligny and his friends with less aversion. This is, however, extremely problematical, for it was Henry the Second who had concludedthat memorable arrangement with his royal brother of Spain, to arrangefor the Huguenot chiefs throughout both realms, a "Sicilian Vespers, "upon the first favorable occasion. His death and the subsequent policy ofthe Queen-Regent deferred the execution of the great scheme till fourteenyears later. Henry had lived long enough, however, after the conclusionof the secret agreement to reveal it to one whose life was to be employedin thwarting this foul conspiracy of monarchs against their subjects. William of Orange, then a hostage for the execution of the treaty ofCateau Cambresis, was the man with whom the King had the unfortunateconception to confer on the subject of the plot. The Prince, who hadalready gained the esteem of Charles the Fifth by his habitualdiscretion, knew how to profit by the intelligence and to bide his time;but his hostility to the policy of the French and Spanish courts wasperhaps dated from that hour. 

Pending the peace negotiations, Philip had been called upon to mourn forhis wife and father. He did not affect grief for the death of Mary Tudor, but he honored the Emperor's departure with stately obsequies atBrussels. The ceremonies lasted two days (the 29th and 30th December, 1558). In the grand and elaborate procession which swept through thestreets upon the first day, the most conspicuous object was a shipfloating apparently upon the waves, and drawn by a band of Tritons whodisported at the bows. The masts, shrouds, and sails of the vessel wereblack, it was covered with heraldic achievements, banners and emblematicmementos of the Emperor's various expeditions, while the flags of Turksand Moors trailed from her sides in the waves below. Three allegoricalpersonages composed the crew. Hope, "all clothyd in brown, with anker inhand, " stood at the prow; Faith, with sacramental chalice and red cross, clad in white garment, with her face nailed "with white tiffany, " sat ona "stool of estate" before the mizen-mast; while Charity "in red, holdingin her hand a burning heart, " was at the helm to navigate the vessel. Hope, Faith, and Love were thought the most appropriate symbols for theman who had invented the edicts, introduced the inquisition, and whoselast words, inscribed by a hand already trembling with death, had adjuredhis son, by his love, allegiance, and hope of salvation, to deal to allheretics the extreme rigor of the law, "without respect of persons andwithout regard to any plea in their favor. "

The rest of the procession, in which marched the Duke of Alva, the Princeof Orange, and other great personages, carrying the sword, the globe, thesceptre, and the "crown imperial, " contained no emblems or imagery worthyof being recorded. The next day the King, dressed in mourning andattended by a solemn train of high officers and nobles, went again to thechurch. A contemporary letter mentions a somewhat singular incident asforming the concluding part of the ceremony. "And the service beingdone, " wrote Sir Richard Clough to Sir Thomas Gresham, "there went anobleman into the herse (so far as I codde understande, it was the Princeof Orange), who, standing before the herse, struck with his hand upon thechest and sayd, 'He is ded. ' Then standing styli awhile, he sayd, 'Heshall remayn ded. ' And 'then resting awhile, he struck again and sayd, 'He is ded, and there is another rysen up in his place greater than everhe was. ' Whereupon the Kynge's hoode was taken off and the Kynge wenthome without his hoode. "

If the mourning for the dead Emperor was but a mummery and a masquerade, there was, however, heartiness and sincerity in the rejoicing which nowburst forth like a sudden illumination throughout the Netherlands, uponthe advent of peace. All was joy in the provinces, but at Antwerp, themetropolis of the land, the enthusiasm was unbounded. Nine days weredevoted to festivities. Bells rang their merriest peals, artillerythundered, beacons blazed, the splendid cathedral spire flamed nightlywith three hundred burning cresaets, the city was strewn with flowers anddecorated with triumphal arches, the Guilds of Rhetoric amazed the worldwith their gorgeous processions, glittering dresses and bombasticversification, the burghers all, from highest to humblest, were feastedand made merry, wine flowed in the streets and oxen were roasted whole, prizes on poles were climbed for, pigs were hunted blindfold, men andwomen raced in sacks, and in short, for nine days long there was oneuniversal and spontaneous demonstration of hilarity in Antwerp andthroughout the provinces. 

But with this merry humor of his subjects, the sovereign had but littlesympathy. There was nothing in his character or purposes which owedaffinity with any mood of this jocund and energetic people. Philip hadnot made peace with all the world that the Netherlanders might climb onpoles or ring bells, or strew flowers in his path for a little holidaytime, and then return to their industrious avocations again. He had madepeace with all the world that he might be free to combat heresy; and thisarch enemy had taken up its strong hold in the provinces. The treaty ofCateau Cambresis left him at liberty to devote himself to that greatenterprise. He had never loved the Netherlands, a residence in theseconstitutional provinces was extremely irksome to him, and he wastherefore anxious to return to Spain. From the depths of his cabinet hefelt that he should be able to direct the enterprise he was resolvedupon, and that his presence in the Netherlands would be superfluous anddisagreeable. 

The early part of the year 1559 was spent by Philip in organizing thegovernment of the provinces and in making the necessary preparations forhis departure. The Duke of Savoy, being restored to his duchy, had, ofcourse, no more leisure to act as Regent of the Netherlands, and it wasnecessary, therefore, to fix upon his successor in this important post, at once. There were several candidates. The Duchess Christina of Lorrainehad received many half promises of the appointment, which she was mostanxious to secure; the Emperor was even said to desire the nomination ofthe Archduke Maximilian, a step which would have certainly argued moremagnanimity upon Philip's part than the world could give him credit for;and besides these regal personages, the high nobles of the land, especially Orange and Egmont, had hopes of obtaining the dignity. ThePrince of Orange, however, was too sagacious to deceive himself long, andbecame satisfied very soon that no Netherlander was likely to be selectedfor Regent. He therefore threw his influence in favor of the DuchessChristina, whose daughter, at the suggestion of the Bishop of Arras, hewas desirous of obtaining in marriage. The King favored for a time, orpretended to favor, both the appointment of Madame de Lorraine and themarriage project of the Prince. Afterwards, however, and in a mannerwhich was accounted both sudden and mysterious, it appeared that theDuchess and Orange had both been deceived, and that the King and Bishophad decided in favor of another candidate, whose claims had not beenconsidered, before, very prominent. This was the Duchess Margaret ofParma, natural daughter of Charles the Fifth. A brief sketch of thisimportant personage, so far as regards her previous career, is reservedfor the following chapter. For the present it is sufficient to state thefact of the nomination. In order to afford a full view of Philip'spolitical arrangements before his final departure from the Netherlands, we defer until the same chapter, an account of the persons who composedthe boards of council organized to assist the new Regent in thegovernment. These bodies themselves were three in number: a state andprivy council and one of finance. They were not new institutions, havingbeen originally established by the Emperor, and were now arranged by hissuccessor upon the same nominal basis upon which they had before existed. The finance council, which had superintendence of all matters relating tothe royal domains and to the annual budgets of the government, waspresided over by Baron Berlaymont. The privy council, of which Vigliuswas president, was composed of ten or twelve learned doctors, and wasespecially entrusted with the control of matters relating to law, pardons, and the general administration of justice. The state council, which was far the most important of the three boards, was to superintendall high affairs of government, war, treaties, foreign intercourse, internal and interprovincial affairs. The members of this council werethe Bishop of Arras, Viglius, Berlaymont, the Prince of Orange, CountEgmont, to which number were afterwards added the Seigneur de Glayon, theDuke of Aerschot, and Count Horn. The last-named nobleman, who wasadmiral of the provinces, had, for the present, been appointed toaccompany the King to Spain, there to be specially entrusted with theadministration of affairs relating to the Netherlands. He was destined, however, to return at the expiration of two years. 

With the object, as it was thought, of curbing the power of the greatnobles, it had been arranged that the three councils should be entirelydistinct from each other, that the members of the state council shouldhave no participation in the affairs of the two other bodies; but, on theother hand, that the finance and privy councillors, as well as theKnights of the Fleece, should have access to the deliberations of thestate council. In the course of events, however, it soon became evidentthat the real power of the government was exclusively in the hands of theconsulta, a committee of three members of the state council, by whosedeliberations the Regent was secretly instructed to be guided on allimportant occasions. The three, Viglius, Berlaymont, and Arras, whocomposed the secret conclave or cabinet, were in reality but one. TheBishop of Arras was in all three, and the three together constituted onlythe Bishop of Arras. 

There was no especial governor or stadholder appointed for the provinceof Brabant, where the Regent was to reside and to exercise executivefunctions in person. The stadholders for the other provinces were, forFlanders and Artois, the Count of Egmont; for Holland, Zeeland, andUtrecht, the Prince of Orange; for Gueldres and Zutfen, the Count ofMeghen; for Friesland, Groningen and Overyssel, Count Aremberg; forHainault, Valenciennes and Cambray, the Marquis of Berghen; for Tournayand Tournaisis, Baron Montigny; for Namur, Baron Berlaymont; forLuxemburg, Count Mansfeld; for Ryssel, Douay and Orchies, the BaronCoureires. All these stadholders were commanders-in-chief of the militaryforces in their respective provinces. With the single exception of CountEgmont, in whose province of Flanders the stadholders were excluded fromthe administration of justice, --all were likewise supreme judges in thecivil and criminal tribunal. The military force of the Netherlands intime of peace was small, for the provinces were jealous of the presenceof soldiery. The only standing army which then legally existed in theNetherlands were the Bandes d'Ordonnance, a body of mountedgendarmerie--amounting in all to three thousand men--which ranked amongthe most accomplished and best disciplined cavalry of Europe. They weredivided into fourteen squadrons, each under the command of a stadholder, or of a distinguished noble. Besides these troops, however, there stillremained in the provinces a foreign force amounting in the aggregate tofour thousand men. These soldiers were the remainder of those largebodies which year after year had been quartered upon the Netherlandsduring the constant warfare to which they had been exposed. Living uponthe substance of the country, paid out of its treasury, and as offensiveby their licentious and ribald habits of life as were the enemies againstwhom they were enrolled, these troops had become an intolerable burthento the people. They were now disposed in different garrisons, nominallyto protect the frontier. As a firm peace, however, had now been concludedbetween Spain and France, and as there was no pretext for compelling theprovinces to accept this protection, the presence of a foreign soldierystrengthened a suspicion that they were to be used in the onslaught whichwas preparing against the religious freedom and the political privilegesof the country. They were to be the nucleus of a larger army, it wasbelieved, by which the land was to be reduced to a state of servilesubjection to Spain. A low, constant, but generally unheeded murmur ofdissatisfaction and distrust upon this subject was already perceptiblethroughout the Netherlands; a warning presage of the coming storm. 

All the provinces were now convoked for the 7th of August (1559), atGhent, there to receive the parting communication and farewell of theKing. Previously to this day, however, Philip appeared in person uponseveral solemn occasions, to impress upon the country the necessity ofattending to the great subject with which his mind was exclusivelyoccupied. He came before the great council of Mechlin, in order toaddress that body with his own lips upon the necessity of supporting theedicts to the letter, and of trampling out every vestige of heresy, wherever it should appear, by the immediate immolation of all heretics, whoever they might be. He likewise caused the estates of Flanders to beprivately assembled, that he might harangue them upon the same greattopic. In the latter part of July he proceeded to Ghent, where a greatconcourse of nobles, citizens, and strangers had already assembled. Here, in the last week of the month, the twenty-third chapter of the GoldenFleece was held with much pomp, and with festivities which lasted threedays. The fourteen vacancies which existed were filled with the names ofvarious distinguished personages. With this last celebration the publichistory of Philip the Good's ostentatious and ambitious order ofknighthood was closed. The subsequent nominations were made 'ex indultuapostolico', and without the assembling of a chapter. 

The estates having duly assembled upon the day prescribed, Philip, attended by Margaret of Parma, the Duke of Savoy, and a stately retinueof ambassadors and grandees, made his appearance before them. After thecustomary ceremonies had been performed, the Bishop of Arras arose anddelivered, in the name of his sovereign, an elaborate address ofinstructions and farewells. In this important harangue, the states wereinformed that the King had convened them in order that they might beinformed of his intention of leaving the Netherlands immediately. Hewould gladly have remained longer in his beloved provinces, had notcircumstances compelled his departure. His father had come hither for thegood of the country in the year 1543, and had never returned to Spain, except to die. 

Upon the King's accession to the sovereignty he had arranged a truce offive years, which had been broken through by the faithlessness of France. He had, therefore, been obliged, notwithstanding his anxiety to return toa country where his presence was so much needed, to remain in theprovinces till he had conducted the new war to a triumphant close. Indoing this he had been solely governed by his intense love for theNetherlands, and by his regard for their interests. All the money whichhe had raised from their coffers had been spent for their protection. Upon this account his Majesty expressed his confidence that the estateswould pay an earnest attention to the "Request" which had been laidbefore them, the more so, as its amount, three millions of gold florins, would all be expended for the good of the provinces. After his return toSpain he hoped to be able to make a remittance. The Duke of Savoy, hecontinued, being obliged, in consequence of the fortunate change in hisaffairs, to resign the government of the Netherlands, and his own son, Don Carlos, not yet being sufficiently advanced in years to succeed tothat important post, his Majesty had selected his sister, the DuchessMargaret of Parma, daughter of the Emperor, as the most proper person forRegent. As she had been born in the Netherlands, and had alwaysentertained a profound affection for the provinces, he felt a firmconfidence that she would prove faithful both to their interests and hisown. As at this moment many countries, and particularly the lands in theimmediate neighborhood, were greatly infested by various "new, reprobate, and damnable sects;" as these sects, proceeding from the foul fiend, father of discord, had not failed to keep those kingdoms in perpetualdissension and misery, to the manifest displeasure of God Almighty; ashis Majesty was desirous to avert such terrible evils from his ownrealms, according to his duty to the Lord God, who would demand reckoningfrom him hereafter for the well-being of the provinces; as all experienceproved that change of religion ever brought desolation and confusion tothe commonweal; as low persons, beggars and vagabonds, under color ofreligion, were accustomed to traverse the land for the purpose of plunderand disturbance; as his Majesty was most desirous of following in thefootsteps of his lord and father; as it would be well remembered what theEmperor had said to him upon the memorable occasion of his abdication;therefore his Majesty had commanded the Regent Margaret of Parma, for thesake of religion and the glory of God, accurately and exactly to cause tobe enforced the edicts and decrees made by his imperial Majesty, andrenewed by his present Majesty, for the extirpation of all sects andheresies. All governors, councillors, and others having authority, werealso instructed to do their utmost to accomplish this great end. 

The great object of the discourse was thus announced in the mostimpressive manner, and with all that conventional rhetoric of which theBishop of Arras was considered a consummate master. Not a word was saidon the subject which was nearest the hearts of the Netherlanders--thewithdrawal of the Spanish troops. 

 [Bentivoglio. Guerra di Fiandra, i. 9 (Opere, Parigi, 1648), gives a different report, which ends with a distinct promise on the part of the King to dismiss the troops as soon as possible: "--in segno di the spetialmente havrebbe quanto prima, a fatti uscire i presidij stranieri dalle fortezze a levata ogn' insolita contributione al paese. " It is almost superfluous to state that the Cardinal is no authority for speeches, except, indeed, for those which were never made. Long orations by generals upon the battle-field, by royal personages in their cabinets, by conspirators in secret conclave, are reported by him with muck minuteness, and none can gainsay the accuracy with which these harangues, which never had any existence, except in the author's imagination, are placed before the reader. Bentivoglio's stately and graceful style, elegant descriptions, and general acquaintance with his subject will always make his works attractive, but the classic and conventional system of inventing long speeches for historical characters has fortunately gone out of fashion. It is very interesting to know what an important personage really did say or write upon remarkable occasions; but it is less instructive to be told what the historian thinks might have been a good speech or epistle for him to utter or indito. ]

Not a hint was held out that a reduction of the taxation, under which theprovinces had so long been groaning, was likely to take place; but, onthe contrary, the King had demanded a new levy of considerable amount. Afew well-turned paragraphs were added on the subject of theadministration of justice--"without which the republic was a dead bodywithout a soul"--in the Bishop's most approved style, and the discourseconcluded with a fervent exhortation to the provinces to trample heresyand heretics out of existence, and with the hope that the Lord God, insuch case, would bestow upon the Netherlands health and happiness. 

After the address had been concluded, the deputies, according to ancientform, requested permission to adjourn, that the representatives of eachprovince might deliberate among themselves on the point of granting orwithholding the Request for the three millions. On the following day theyagain assembled in the presence of the King, for the purpose of returningtheir separate answers to the propositions. 

The address first read was that of the Estates of Artois. The chairman ofthe deputies from that province read a series of resolutions, drawn up, says a contemporary, "with that elegance which characterized all thepublic acts of the Artesians; bearing witness to the vivacity of theirwits. " The deputies spoke of the extreme affection which their provincehad always borne to his Majesty and to the Emperor. They had proved it bythe constancy with which they had endured the calamities of war so long, and they now cheerfully consented to the Request, so far as theircontingent went. They were willing to place at his Majesty's disposal, not only the remains of their property, but even the last drop of theirblood. As the eloquent chairman reached this point in his discourse, Philip, who was standing with his arm resting upon Egmont's shoulder, listening eagerly to the Artesian address, looked upon the deputies ofthe province with a smiling face, expressing by the unwonted benignity ofhis countenance the satisfaction which he received from these loyalexpressions of affection, and this dutiful compliance with his Request. 

The deputy, however, proceeded to an unexpected conclusion, by earnestlyentreating his Majesty, as a compensation for the readiness thus evincedin the royal service, forthwith to order the departure of all foreigntroops then in the Netherlands. Their presence, it was added, was nowrendered completely superfluous by the ratification of the treaty ofpeace so fortunately arranged with all the world. 

At this sudden change in the deputy's language, the King, no longersmiling, threw himself violently upon his chair of state, where heremained, brooding with a gloomy countenance upon the language which hadbeen addressed to him. It was evident, said an eye-witness, that he wasdeeply offended. He changed color frequently, so that all present "couldremark, from the working of his face, how much his mind was agitated. "

The rest of the provinces were even more explicit than the deputies ofArtois. All had voted their contingents to the Request, but all had madethe withdrawal of the troops an express antecedent condition to thepayment of their respective quotas. 

The King did not affect to conceal his rage at these conditions, exclaiming bitterly to Count Egmont and other seignors near the thronethat it was very easy to estimate, by these proceedings, the value of theprotestations made by the provinces of their loyalty and affection. 

Besides, however, the answers thus addressed by the separate states tothe royal address, a formal remonstrance had also been drawn up in thename of the States General, and signed by the Prince of Orange, CountEgmont, and many of the leading patricians of the Netherlands. Thisdocument, which was formally presented to the King before the adjournmentof the assembly, represented the infamous "pillaging, insults, anddisorders" daily exercised by the foreign soldiery; stating that theburthen had become intolerable, and that the inhabitants of Marienburg, and of many other large towns and villages had absolutely abandoned theirhomes rather than remain any longer exposed to such insolence andoppression. 

The king, already enraged, was furious at the presentation of thispetition. He arose from his seat, and rushed impetuously from theassembly, demanding of the members as he went, whether he too, as aSpaniard, was expected immediately to leave the land, and to resign allauthority over it. The Duke of Savoy made use of this last occasion inwhich he appeared in public as Regent, violently to rebuke the estatesfor the indignity thus offered to their sovereign. 

It could not be forgotten, however, by nobles and burghers, who had notyet been crushed by the long course of oppression which was in store forthem, that there had been a day when Philip's ancestors had been morehumble in their deportment in the face of the provincial authorities. Hisgreat-grandfather, Maximilian, kept in durance by the citizens of Bruges;his great-grandmother, Mary of Burgundy, with streaming eyes anddishevelled hair, supplicating in the market-place for the lives of hertreacherous ambassadors, were wont to hold a less imperious language tothe delegates of the states. 

This burst of ill temper on the part of the monarch was, however, succeeded by a different humor. It was still thought advisable todissemble, and to return rather an expostulatory than a peremptory answerto the remonstrance of the States General. Accordingly a paper of asingular tone was, after the delay of a few days, sent into the assembly. In this message it was stated that the King was not desirous of placingstrangers in the government--a fact which was proved by the appointmentof the Duchess Margaret; that the Spanish infantry was necessary toprotect the land from invasion; that the remnant of foreign troops onlyamounted to three or four thousand men, who claimed considerable arrearsof pay, but that the amount due would be forwarded to them immediatelyafter his Majesty's return to Spain. It was suggested that the troopswould serve as an escort for Don Carlos when he should arrive in theNetherlands, although the King would have been glad to carry them toSpain in his fleet, had he known the wishes of the estates in time. Hewould, however, pay for their support himself, although they were to actsolely for the good of the provinces. He observed, moreover, that he hadselected two seignors of the provinces, the Prince of Orange and CountEgmont, to take command of these foreign troops, and he promisedfaithfully that, in the course of three or four months at furthest, theyshould all be withdrawn. 

On the same day in which the estates had assembled at Ghent, Philip hadaddressed an elaborate letter to the grand council of Mechlin, thesupreme court of the provinces, and to the various provincial councilsand tribunals of the whole country. The object of the communication wasto give his final orders on the subject of the edicts, and for theexecution of all heretics in the most universal and summary manner. Hegave stringent and unequivocal instructions that these decrees forburning, strangling, and burying alive, should be fulfilled to theletter. He ordered all judicial officers and magistrates "to be curiousto enquire on all sides as to the execution of the placards, " stating hisintention that "the utmost rigor should be employed without any respectof persons, " and that not only the transgressors should be proceededagainst, but also the judges who should prove remiss in their prosecutionof heretics. He alluded to a false opinion which had gained currency thatthe edicts were only intended against anabaptists. Correcting this error, he stated that they were to be "enforced against all sectaries, withoutany distinction or mercy, who might be spotted merely with the errorsintroduced by Luther. "

The King, notwithstanding the violent scenes in the assembly, took leaveof the estates at another meeting with apparent cordiality. Hisdissatisfaction was sufficiently manifest, but it expressed itselfprincipally against individuals. His displeasure at the course pursued bythe leading nobles, particularly by the Prince of Orange, was already nosecret. 

Philip, soon after the adjournment of the assembly, had completed thepreparations for his departure. At Middelburg he was met by the agreeableintelligence that the Pope had consented to issue a bull for the creationof the new bishoprics which he desired for the Netherlands. --Thisimportant subject will be resumed in another chapter; for the present weaccompany the King to Flushing, whence the fleet was to set sail forSpain. He was escorted thither by the Duchess Regent, the Duke of Savoy, and by many of the most eminent personages of the provinces. Among othersWilliam of Orange was in attendance to witness the final departure of theKing, and to pay him his farewell respects. As Philip was proceeding onboard the ship which was to bear him forever from the Netherlands, hiseyes lighted upon the Prince. His displeasure could no longer berestrained. With angry face he turned upon him, and bitterly reproachedhim for having thwarted all his plans by means of his secret intrigues. William replied with humility that every thing which had taken place hadbeen done through the regular and natural movements of the states. Uponthis the King, boiling with rage, seized the Prince by the wrist, andshaking it violently, exclaimed in Spanish, "No los estados, ma vos, vos, vos!--Not the estates, but you, you, you!" repeating thrice the word vos, which is as disrespectful and uncourteous in Spanish as "toi" in French. 

After this severe and public insult, the Prince of Orange did not go onboard his Majesty's vessel, but contented himself with wishing Philip, from the shore, a fortunate journey. It may be doubted, moreover, whetherhe would not have made a sudden and compulsory voyage to Spain had heventured his person in the ship, and whether, under the circumstances, hewould have been likely to effect as speedy a return. His caution servedhim then as it was destined to do on many future occasions, and Philipleft the Netherlands with this parting explosion of hatred against theman who, as he perhaps instinctively felt, was destined to circumvent hismeasures and resist his tyranny to the last. 

The fleet, which consisted of ninety vessels, so well provisioned that, among other matters, fifteen thousand capons were put on board, accordingto the Antwerp chronicler, set sail upon the 26th August (1559), fromFlushing. The voyage proved tempestuous, so that much of the richtapestry and other merchandise which had been accumulated by Charles andPhilip was lost. Some of the vessels foundered; to save others it wasnecessary to lighten the cargo, and "to enrobe the roaring waters withthe silks, " for which the Netherlands were so famous; so that it was saidthat Philip and his father had impoverished the earth only to enrich theocean. The fleet had been laden with much valuable property, because theKing had determined to fix for the future the wandering capital of hisdominions in Spain. Philip landed in safety, however, at Laredo, on the8th September. His escape from imminent peril confirmed him in the greatpurpose to which he had consecrated his existence. He believed himself tohave been reserved from shipwreck only because a mighty mission had beenconfided to him, and lest his enthusiasm against heresy should languish, his eyes were soon feasted, upon his arrival in his native country, withthe spectacle of an auto-da fe. 

Early in January of this year the King being persuaded that it wasnecessary every where to use additional means to check the alarmingspread of Lutheran opinions, had written to the Pope for authority toincrease, if that were possible, the stringency of the Spanishinquisition. The pontiff, nothing loath, had accordingly issued a bulldirected to the inquisitor general, Valdez, by which he was instructed toconsign to the flames all prisoners whatever, even those who were notaccused of having "relapsed. " Great preparations had been made to striketerror into the hearts of heretics by a series of horrible exhibitions, in the course of which the numerous victims, many of them persons of highrank, distinguished learning, and exemplary lives, who had long beenlanguishing in the dungeons of the holy office, were to be consigned tothe flames. The first auto-da fe had been consummated at Valladolid onthe 21st May (1559), in the absence of the King, of course, but in thepresence of the royal family and the principal notabilities, civil, ecclesiastical, and military. The Princess Regent, seated on her throne, close to the scaffold, had held on high the holy sword. The Archbishop ofSeville, followed by the ministers of the inquisition and by the victims, had arrived in solemn procession at the "cadahalso, " where, after theusual sermon in praise of the holy office and in denunciation of heresy, he had administered the oath to the Intante, who had duly sworn upon thecrucifix to maintain forever the sacred inquisition and the apostolicdecrees. The Archbishop had then cried aloud, "So may God prosper yourHighnesses and your estates;" after which the men and women who formedthe object of the show had been cast into the flames. --[Cabrera]. Itbeing afterwards ascertained that the King himself would soon be enabledto return to Spain, the next festival was reserved as a fittingcelebration for his arrival. Upon the 8th October, accordingly, anotherauto-da fe took place at Valladolid. The King, with his sister and hisson, the high officers of state, the foreign ministers, and all thenobility of the kingdom, were present, together with an immense concourseof soldiery, clergy, and populace. The sermon was preached by the Bishopof Cuenga. When it was finished, Inquisitor General Valdez cried with aloud voice, "Oh God, make speed to help us!" The King then drew hissword. Valdez, advancing to the platform upon which Philip was seated, proceeded to read the protestation: "Your Majesty swears by the cross ofthe sword, whereon your royal hand reposes, that you will give allnecessary favor to the holy office of the inquisition against heretics, apostates, and those who favor them, and will denounce and inform againstall those who, to your royal knowledge, shall act or speak against thefaith. " The King answered aloud, "I swear it, " and signed the paper. Theoath was read to the whole assembly by an officer of the inquisition. Thirteen distinguished victims were then burned before the monarch'seyes, besides one body which a friendly death had snatched from the handsof the holy office, and the effigy of another person who had beencondemned, although not yet tried or even apprehended. Among thesufferers was Carlos de Sessa, a young noble of distinguished characterand abilities, who said to the King as he passed by the throne to thestake, "How can you thus look on and permit me to be burned?" Philip thenmade the memorable reply, carefully recorded by his historiographer andpanegyrist; "I would carry the wood to burn my own son withal, were he aswicked as you. "

In Seville, immediately afterwards, another auto-da fe was held, in whichfifty living heretics were burned, besides the bones of DoctorConstantine Ponce de la Fuente, once the friend, chaplain, and almoner ofPhilip's father. This learned and distinguished ecclesiastic had beenreleased from a dreadful dungeon by a fortunate fever. The holy office, however, not content with punishing his corpse, wreaked also an impotentand ludicrous malice upon his effigy. A stuffed figure, attired in hisrobes and with its arms extended in the attitude which was habitual withhim in prayer, was placed upon the scaffold among the living victims, andthen cast into the flames, that bigotry might enjoy a fantastic triumphover the grave. 

Such were the religious ceremonies with which Philip celebrated hisescape from shipwreck, and his marriage with Isabella of France, immediately afterwards solemnized. These human victims, chained andburning at the stake, were the blazing torches which lighted the monarchto his nuptial couch. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Consign to the flames all prisoners whatever (Papal letter) Courage of despair inflamed the French Decrees for burning, strangling, and burying alive I would carry the wood to burn my own son withal Inventing long speeches for historical characters Let us fool these poor creatures to their heart's content Petty passion for contemptible details Promises which he knew to be binding only upon the weak Rashness alternating with hesitation These human victims, chained and burning at the stake

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 5. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

ADMINISTRATION OF THE DUCHESS MARGARET. 

CHAPTER I. 1559-1560

 Biographical sketch and portrait of Margaret of Parma--The state council--Berlaymont--Viglius--Sketch of William the Silent--Portrait of Antony Perrenot, afterwards Cardinal Granvelle--General view of the political, social and religious condition of the Netherlands-- Habits of the aristocracy--Emulation in extravagance--Pecuniary embarrassments--Sympathy for the Reformation, steadily increasing among the people, the true cause of the impending revolt--Measures of the government. --Edict of 1550 described--Papal Bulls granted to Philip for increasing the number of Bishops in the Netherlands-- Necessity for retaining the Spanish troops to enforce the policy of persecution. 

Margaret of Parma, newly appointed Regent of the Netherlands, was thenatural daughter of Charles the Fifth, and his eldest born child. Hermother, of a respectable family called Van der Genst, in Oudenarde, hadbeen adopted and brought up by the distinguished house of Hoogstraaten. Peculiar circumstances, not necessary to relate at length, had palliatedthe fault to which Margaret owed her imperial origin, and gave the childalmost a legitimate claim upon its father's protection. The claim washonorably acknowledged. Margaret was in her infancy placed by the Emperorin the charge of his paternal aunt, Margaret of Savoy, then Regent of theprovinces. Upon the death of that princess, the child was entrusted tothe care of the Emperor's sister, Mary, Queen Dowager of Hungary, who hadsucceeded to the government, and who occupied it until the abdication. The huntress-queen communicated her tastes to her youthful niece, andMargaret soon outrivalled her instructress. The ardor with which shepursued the stag, and the courageous horsemanship which she alwaysdisplayed, proved her, too, no degenerate descendant of Mary of Burgundy. Her education for the distinguished position in which she had somewhatsurreptitiously been placed was at least not neglected in thisparticular. When, soon after the memorable sack of Rome, the Pope and theEmperor had been reconciled, and it had been decided that the Medicifamily should be elevated upon the ruins of Florentine liberty, Margaret's hand was conferred in marriage upon the pontiff's nephewAlexander. The wretched profligate who was thus selected to mate with theEmperor's eldest born child and to appropriate the fair demesnes of theTuscan republic was nominally the offspring of Lorenzo de Medici by aMoorish slave, although generally reputed a bastard of the Pope himself. The nuptials were celebrated with great pomp at Naples, where the Emperorrode at the tournament in the guise of a Moorish warrior. At Florencesplendid festivities had also been held, which were troubled with omensbelieved to be highly unfavorable. It hardly needed, however, preternatural appearances in heaven or on earth to proclaim the marriageill-starred which united a child of twelve years with a worn-outdebauchee of twenty-seven. Fortunately for Margaret, the funerealportents proved true. Her husband, within the first year of their weddedlife, fell a victim to his own profligacy, and was assassinated by hiskinsman, Lorenzino de Medici. Cosmo, his successor in the tyranny ofFlorence, was desirous of succeeding to the hand of Margaret, but thepolitic Emperor, thinking that he had already done enough to conciliatethat house, was inclined to bind to his interests the family which nowoccupied the papal throne. Margaret was accordingly a few yearsafterwards united to Ottavio Farnese, nephew of Paul the Third. It wasstill her fate to be unequally matched. Having while still a child beenwedded to a man of more than twice her years, she was now, at the age oftwenty, united to an immature youth of thirteen. She conceived so strongan aversion to her new husband, that it became impossible for them tolive together in peace. Ottavio accordingly went to the wars, and in 1541accompanied the Emperor in his memorable expedition to Barbary. 

Rumors of disaster by battle and tempest reaching Europe before theresults of the expedition were accurately known, reports that the Emperorhad been lost in a storm, and that the young Ottavio had perished withhim, awakened remorse in the bosom of Margaret. It seemed to her that hehad been driven forth by domestic inclemency to fall a victim to theelements. When, however, the truth became known, and it was ascertainedthat her husband, although still living, was lying dangerously ill in thecharge of the Emperor, the repugnance which had been founded upon hisextreme youth changed to passionate fondness. His absence, and hisfaithful military attendance upon her father, caused a revulsion in herfeelings, and awakened her admiration. When Ottavio, now created Duke ofParma and Piacenza, returned to Rome, he was received by his wife withopen arms. Their union was soon blessed with twins, and but for a certainimperiousness of disposition which Margaret had inherited from herfather, and which she was too apt to exercise even upon her husband, themarriage would have been sufficiently fortunate. 

Various considerations pointed her out to Philip as a suitable person forthe office of Regent, although there seemed some mystery about theappointment which demanded explanation. It was thought that her birthwould make her acceptable to the people; but perhaps, the secret reasonwith Philip was, that she alone of all other candidates would be amenableto the control of the churchman in whose hand he intended placing thereal administration of the provinces. Moreover, her husband was verydesirous that the citadel of Piacenza, still garrisoned by Spanishtroops, should be surrendered to him. Philip was disposed to conciliatethe Duke, but unwilling to give up the fortress. He felt that Ottaviowould be flattered by the nomination of his wife to so important anoffice, and be not too much dissatisfied at finding himself relieved fora time from her imperious fondness. Her residence in the Netherlandswould guarantee domestic tranquillity to her husband, and peace in Italyto the King. Margaret would be a hostage for the fidelity of the Duke, who had, moreover, given his eldest son to Philip to be educated in hisservice. 

She was about thirty-seven years of age when she arrived in theNetherlands, with the reputation of possessing high talents, and a proudand energetic character. She was an enthusiastic Catholic, and had sat atthe feet of Loyola, who had been her confessor and spiritual guide. Shefelt a greater horror for heretics than for any other species ofmalefactors, and looked up to her father's bloody edicts as if they hadbeen special revelations from on high. She was most strenuous in herobservance of Roman rites, and was accustomed to wash the feet of twelvevirgins every holy week, and to endow them in marriage afterwards. --Heracquirements, save that of the art of horsemanship, were not remarkable. 

Carefully educated in the Machiavellian and Medicean school of politics, she was versed in that "dissimulation, " to which liberal Anglo-Saxonsgive a shorter name, but which formed the main substance of statesmanshipat the court of Charles and Philip. In other respects her accomplishmentswere but meagre, and she had little acquaintance with any language butItalian. Her personal appearance, which was masculine, but not without acertain grand and imperial fascination, harmonized with the opiniongenerally entertained of her character. The famous moustache upon herupper lips was supposed to indicate authority and virility of purpose, animpression which was confirmed by the circumstance that she was liable tosevere attacks of gout, a disorder usually considered more appropriate tothe sterner sex. 

Such were the previous career and public reputation of the DuchessMargaret. It remains to be unfolded whether her character and endowments, as exemplified in her new position, were to justify the choice of Philip. 

The members of the state council, as already observed, were Berlaymont, Viglius, Arras, Orange, and Egmont. 

The first was, likewise, chief of the finance department. Most of theCatholic writers described him as a noble of loyal and highly honorablecharacter. Those of the Protestant party, on the contrary, uniformlydenounced him as greedy, avaricious, and extremely sanguinary. That hewas a brave and devoted soldier, a bitter papist, and an inflexibleadherent to the royal cause, has never been disputed. The Baron himself, with his four courageous and accomplished sons, were ever in the frontranks to defend the crown against the nation. It must be confessed, however, that fanatical loyalty loses most of the romance with whichgenius and poetry have so often hallowed the sentiment, when the"legitimate" prince for whom the sword is drawn is not only an alien intongue and blood, but filled with undisguised hatred for the land heclaims to rule. 

Viglius van Aytta van Zuichem was a learned Frisian, born, according tosome writers, of "boors' degree, but having no inclination for boorishwork". According to other authorities, which the President himselffavored, he was of noble origin; but, whatever his race, it is certainthat whether gentle or simple, it derived its first and only historicalillustration from his remarkable talents and acquirements. These in earlyyouth were so great as to acquire the commendation of Erasmus. He hadstudied in Louvain, Paris, and Padua, had refused the tutorship Philipwhen that prince was still a child, and had afterwards filled aprofessorship at Ingolstadt. After rejecting several offers of promotionfrom the Emperor, he had at last accepted in 1542 a seat in the councilof Mechlin, of which body he had become president in 1545. He had beenone of the peace commissioners to France in 1558, and was now presidentof the privy council, a member of the state council, and of the inner andsecret committee of that board, called the Consults. Much odium wasattached to his name for his share in the composition of the famous edictof 1550. The rough draught was usually attributed to his pen, but hecomplained bitterly, in letters written at this time, of injustice donehim in this respect, and maintained that he had endeavored, withoutsuccess, to induce the Emperor to mitigate the severity of the edict. Onedoes not feel very strongly inclined to accept his excuses, however, whenhis general opinions on the subject of religion are remembered. He wasmost bigoted in precept and practice. Religious liberty he regarded asthe most detestable and baleful of doctrines; heresy he denounced as themost unpardonable of crimes. 

From no man's mouth flowed more bitter or more elegant commonplaces thanfrom that of the learned president against those blackest of malefactors, the men who claimed within their own walls the right to worship Godaccording to their own consciences. For a common person, not learned inlaw or divinity, to enter into his closet, to shut the door, and to prayto Him who seeth in secret, was, in his opinion, to open wide the gate ofdestruction for all the land, and to bring in the Father of Evil at onceto fly away with the whole population, body and soul. "If every man, "said he to Hopper, "is to believe what he likes in his own house, weshall have hearth gods and tutelar divinities, again, the country willswarm with a thousand errors and sects, and very few there will be, Ifear, who will allow themselves to be enclosed in the sheepfold ofChrist. I have ever considered this opinion, " continued the president, "the most pernicious of all. They who hold it have a contempt for allreligion, and are neither more nor less than atheists. This vague, fireside liberty should be by every possible means extirpated; thereforedid Christ institute shepherds to drive his wandering sheep back into thefold of the true Church; thus only can we guard the lambs against theravening wolves, and prevent their being carried away from the flock ofChrist to the flock of Belial. Liberty of religion, or of conscience, asthey call it, ought never to be tolerated. "

This was the cant with which Viglius was ever ready to feed not only hisfaithful Hopper, but all the world beside. The president was naturallyanxious that the fold of Christ should be entrusted to none but regularshepherds, for he looked forward to taking one of the most lucrativecrooks into his own hand, when he should retire from his secular career. 

It is now necessary to say a few introductory words concerning the manwho, from this time forth, begins to rise upon the history of his countrywith daily increasing grandeur and influence. William of Nassau, Princeof Orange, although still young in years, is already the centralpersonage about whom the events and the characters of the epoch mostnaturally group themselves; destined as he is to become more and morewith each succeeding year the vivifying source of light, strength, andnational life to a whole people. 

The Nassau family first emerges into distinct existence in the middle ofthe eleventh century. It divides itself almost as soon as known into twogreat branches. The elder remained in Germany, ascended the imperialthrone in the thirteenth century in the person of Adolph of Nassau andgave to the country many electors, bishops, and generals. The younger andmore illustrious branch retained the modest property and pettysovereignty of Nassau Dillenbourg, but at the same time transplanteditself to the Netherlands, where it attained at an early period to greatpower and large possessions. The ancestors of William, as Dukes ofGueldres, had begun to exercise sovereignty in the provinces fourcenturies before the advent of the house of Burgundy. That overshadowingfamily afterwards numbered the Netherland Nassaus among its most stanchand powerful adherents. Engelbert the Second was distinguished in theturbulent councils and in the battle-fields of Charles the Bold, and wasafterwards the unwavering supporter of Maximilian, in court and camp. Dying childless, he was succeeded by his brother John, whose two sons, Henry and William, of Nassau, divided the great inheritance after theirfather's death, William succeeded to the German estates, became a convertto Protestantism, and introduced the Reformation into his dominions. Henry, the eldest son, received the family possessions and titles inLuxembourg, Brabant, Flanders and Holland, and distinguished himself asmuch as his uncle Engelbert, in the service of the Burgundo-Austrianhouse. The confidential friend of Charles the Fifth, whose governor hehad been in that Emperor's boyhood, he was ever his most efficient andreliable adherent. It was he whose influence placed the imperial crownupon the head of Charles. In 1515 he espoused Claudia de Chalons, sisterof Prince Philibert of Orange, "in order, " as he wrote to his father, "tobe obedient to his imperial Majesty, to please the King of France, andmore particularly for the sake of his own honor and profit. "

His son Rene de Nassau-Chalons succeeded Philibert. The littleprincipality of Orange, so pleasantly situated between Provence andDauphiny, but in such dangerous proximity to the seat of the "Babyloniancaptivity" of the popes at Avignon, thus passed to the family of Nassau. The title was of high antiquity. Already in the reign of Charlemagne, Guillaume au Court-Nez, or "William with the Short Nose, " had defendedthe little--town of Orange against the assaults of the Saracens. Theinterest and authority acquired in the demesnes thus preserved by hisvalor became extensive, and in process of time hereditary in his race. The principality became an absolute and free sovereignty, and had alreadydescended, in defiance of the Salic law, through the three distinctfamilies of Orange, Baux, and Chalons. 

In 1544, Prince Rene died at the Emperor's feet in the trenches of SaintDizier. Having no legitimate children, he left all his titles and estatesto his cousin-german, William of Nassau, son of his father's brotherWilliam, who thus at the age of eleven years became William the Ninth ofOrange. For this child, whom the future was to summon to such highdestinies and such heroic sacrifices, the past and present seemed to havegathered riches and power together from many sources. He was thedescendant of the Othos, the Engelberts, and the Henries, of theNetherlands, the representative of the Philiberts and the Renes ofFrance; the chief of a house, humbler in resources and position inGermany, but still of high rank, and which had already done good serviceto humanity by being among the first to embrace the great principles ofthe Reformation. 

His father, younger brother of the Emperor's friend Henry, was calledWilliam the Rich. He was, however, only rich in children. Of these he hadfive sons and seven daughters by his wife Juliana of Stolberg. She was aperson of most exemplary character and unaffected piety. She instilledinto the minds of all her children the elements of that devotionalsentiment which was her own striking characteristic, and it was destinedthat the seed sown early should increase to an abundant harvest. Nothingcan be more tender or more touching than the letters which still existfrom her hand, written to her illustrious sons in hours of anxiety oranguish, and to the last, recommending to them with as much earnestsimplicity as if they were still little children at her knee, to relyalways in the midst of the trials and dangers which were to beset theirpaths through life, upon the great hand of God. Among the mothers ofgreat men, Juliana of Stolberg deserves a foremost place, and it is noslight eulogy that she was worthy to have been the mother of William ofOrange and of Lewis, Adolphus, Henry, and John of Nassau. 

At the age of eleven years, William having thus unexpectedly succeeded tosuch great possessions, was sent from his father's roof to be educated inBrussels. No destiny seemed to lie before the young prince but aneducation at the Emperor's court, to be followed by military adventures, embassies, viceroyalties, and a life of luxury and magnificence. At avery early age he came, accordingly, as a page into the Emperor's family. Charles recognized, with his customary quickness, the remarkablecharacter of the boy. At fifteen, William was the intimate, almostconfidential friend of the Emperor, who prided himself, above all othergifts, on his power of reading and of using men. The youth was soconstant an attendant upon his imperial chief that even when interviewswith the highest personages, and upon the gravest affairs, were takingplace, Charles would never suffer him to be considered superfluous orintrusive. There seemed to be no secrets which the Emperor held too highfor the comprehension or discretion of his page. His perceptive andreflective faculties, naturally of remarkable keenness and depth, thusacquired a precocious and extraordinary development. He was brought upbehind the curtain of that great stage where the world's dramas weredaily enacted. The machinery and the masks which produced the granddelusions of history had no deceptions for him. Carefully to observemen's actions, and silently to ponder upon their motives, was thefavorite occupation of the Prince during his apprenticeship at court. Ashe advanced to man's estate, he was selected by the Emperor for thehighest duties. Charles, whose only merit, so far as the provinces wereconcerned, was in having been born in Ghent, and that by an ignobleaccident, was glad to employ this representative of so many greatNetherland houses, in the defence of the land. Before the Prince wastwenty-one he was appointed general-in-chief of the army on the Frenchfrontier, in the absence of the Duke of Savoy. The post was coveted bymany most distinguished soldiers: the Counts of Buren, Bossu, Lalaing, Aremberg, Meghem, and particularly by Count Egmont; yet Charles showedhis extraordinary confidence in the Prince of Orange, by selecting himfor the station, although he had hardly reached maturity, and wasmoreover absent in France. The young Prince acquitted himself of his highcommand in a manner which justified his appointment. 

It was the Prince's shoulder upon which the Emperor leaned at theabdication; the Prince's hand which bore the imperial insignia of thediscrowned monarch to Ferdinand, at Augsburg. With these duties hisrelations with Charles were ended, and those with Philip begun. He waswith the army during the hostilities which were soon after resumed inPicardy; he was the secret negotiator of the preliminary arrangement withFrance, soon afterwards confirmed by the triumphant treaty of April, 1559. He had conducted these initiatory conferences with the ConstableMontmorency and Marshal de Saint Andre with great sagacity, althoughhardly a man in years, and by so doing he had laid Philip under deepobligations. The King was so inexpressibly anxious for peace that hewould have been capable of conducting a treaty upon almost any terms. Heassured the Prince that "the greatest service he could render him in thisworld was to make peace, and that he desired to have it at any price whatever, so eager was he to return to Spain. " To the envoy Suriano, Philiphad held the same language. "Oh, Ambassador, " said he, "I wish peace onany terms, and if the King of France had not sued for it, I would havebegged for it myself. "

With such impatience on the part of the sovereign, it certainlymanifested diplomatic abilities of a high character in the Prince, thatthe treaty negotiated by him amounted to a capitulation by France. He wasone of the hostages selected by Henry for the due execution of thetreaty, and while in France made that remarkable discovery which was tocolor his life. While hunting with the King in the forest of Vincennes, the Prince and Henry found themselves alone together, and separated fromthe rest of the company. The French monarch's mind was full of the greatscheme which had just secretly been formed by Philip and himself, toextirpate Protestantism by a general extirpation of Protestants. Philiphad been most anxious to conclude the public treaty with France, that hemight be the sooner able to negotiate that secret convention by which heand his Most Christian Majesty were solemnly to bind themselves tomassacre all the converts to the new religion in France and theNetherlands. This conspiracy of the two Kings against their subjects wasthe matter nearest the hearts of both. The Duke of Alva, a fellow hostagewith William of Orange, was the plenipotentiary to conduct this moreimportant arrangement. The French monarch, somewhat imprudently imaginingthat the Prince was also a party to the plot, opened the whole subject tohim without reserve. He complained of the constantly increasing numbersof sectaries in his kingdom, and protested that his conscience wouldnever be easy, nor his state secure until his realm should be deliveredof "that accursed vermin. " A civil revolution, under pretext of areligious reformation, was his constant apprehension, particularly sinceso many notable personages in the realm, and even princes of the blood, were already tainted with heresy. Nevertheless, with the favor of heaven, and the assistance of his son and brother Philip, he hoped soon to bemaster of the rebels. The King then proceeded, with cynical minuteness, to lay before his discreet companion the particulars of the royal plot, and the manner in which all heretics, whether high or humble, were to bediscovered and massacred at the most convenient season. For thefurtherance of the scheme in the Netherlands, it was understood that theSpanish regiments would be exceedingly efficient. The Prince, althoughhorror-struck and indignant at the royal revelations, held his peace, andkept his countenance. The King was not aware that, in opening thisdelicate negotiation to Alva's colleague and Philip's plenipotentiary, hehad given a warning of inestimable value to the man who had been born toresist the machinations of Philip and of Alva. William of Orange earnedthe surname of "the Silent, " from the manner in which he received thesecommunications of Henry without revealing to the monarch, by word orlook, the enormous blunder which he had committed. His purpose was fixedfrom that hour. A few days afterwards he obtained permission to visit theNetherlands, where he took measures to excite, with all his influence, the strongest and most general opposition to the continued presence ofthe Spanish troops, of which forces, touch against his will, he had been, in conjunction with Egmont, appointed chief. He already felt, in his ownlanguage, that "an inquisition for the Netherlands had been, resolvedupon more cruel than that of Spain; since it would need but to lookaskance at an image to be cast into the flames. " Although having as yetno spark of religious sympathy for the reformers, he could not, he said, "but feel compassion for so many virtuous men and women thus devoted tomassacre, " and he determined to save them if he could!' At the departureof Philip he had received instructions, both patent and secret, for hisguidance as stadholder of Holland, Friesland, and Utrecht. He was ordered"most expressly to correct and extirpate the sects reprobated by our HolyMother Church; to execute the edicts of his Imperial Majesty, renewed bythe King, with absolute rigor. He was to see that the judges carried outthe edicts, without infraction, alteration, or moderation, since theywere there to enforce, not to make or to discuss the law. " In his secretinstructions he was informed that the execution of the edicts was to bewith all rigor, and without any respect of persons. He was also remindedthat, whereas some persons had imagined the severity of the law "to beonly intended against Anabaptists, on the contrary, the edicts were to beenforced on Lutherans and all other sectaries without distinction. "Moreover, in one of his last interviews with Philip, the King had givenhim the names of several "excellent persons suspected of the newreligion, " and had commanded him to have them put to death. This, however, he not only omitted to do, but on the contrary gave themwarning, so that they might effect their escape, "thinking it morenecessary to obey God than man. "

William of Orange, at the departure of the King for Spain, was in histwenty-seventh year. He was a widower; his first wife, Anne of Egmont, having died in 1558, after seven years of wedlock. This lady, to whom hehad been united when they were both eighteen years of age, was thedaughter of the celebrated general, Count de Buren, and the greatestheiress in the Netherlands. William had thus been faithful to the familytraditions, and had increased his possessions by a wealthy alliance. Hehad two children, Philip and Mary. The marriage had been more amicablethan princely marriages arranged for convenience often prove. The lettersof the Prince to his wife indicate tenderness and contentment. At thesame time he was accused, at a later period, of "having murdered her witha dagger. " The ridiculous tale was not even credited by those whoreported it, but it is worth mentioning, as a proof that no calumny wastoo senseless to be invented concerning the man whose character was fromthat hour forth to be the mark of slander, and whose whole life was to beits signal, although often unavailing, refutation. 

Yet we are not to regard William of Orange, thus on the threshold of hisgreat career, by the light diffused from a somewhat later period. In nohistorical character more remarkably than in his is the law of constantdevelopment and progress illustrated. At twenty-six he is not the "paterpatriae, " the great man struggling upward and onward against a host ofenemies and obstacles almost beyond human strength, and along the darkand dangerous path leading through conflict, privation, and ceaselesslabor to no repose but death. On the contrary, his foot was hardly on thefirst step of that difficult ascent which was to rise before him all hislifetime. He was still among the primrose paths. He was rich, powerful, of sovereign rank. He had only the germs within him of what wasthereafter to expand into moral and intellectual greatness. He had smallsympathy for the religious reformation, of which he was to be one of themost distinguished champions. He was a Catholic, nominally, and inoutward observance. With doctrines he troubled himself but little. He hadgiven orders to enforce conformity to the ancient Church, not withbloodshed, yet with comparative strictness, in his principality ofOrange. Beyond the compliance with rites and forms, thought indispensablein those days to a personage of such high degree, he did not occupyhimself with theology. He was a Catholic, as Egmont and Horn, Berlaymontand Mansfeld, Montigny and even Brederode, were Catholic. It was onlytanners, dyers and apostate priests who were Protestants at that day inthe Netherlands. His determination to protect a multitude of his harmlessinferiors from horrible deaths did not proceed from sympathy with theirreligious sentiments, but merely from a generous and manly detestation ofmurder. He carefully averted his mind from sacred matters. If indeed theseed implanted by his pious parents were really the germ of his futureconversion to Protestantism, it must be confessed that it lay dormant along time. But his mind was in other pursuits. He was disposed for aneasy, joyous, luxurious, princely life. Banquets, masquerades, tournaments, the chase, interspersed with the routine of official duties, civil and military, seemed likely to fill out his life. His hospitality, like his fortune, was almost regal. While the King and the foreign envoyswere still in the Netherlands, his house, the splendid Nassau palace ofBrussels, was ever open. He entertained for the monarch, who was, or whoimagined himself to be, too poor to discharge his own duties in thisrespect, but he entertained at his own expense. This splendid householdwas still continued. Twenty-four noblemen and eighteen pages of gentlebirth officiated regularly in his family. His establishment was on soextensive a scale that upon one day twenty-eight master cooks weredismissed, for the purpose of diminishing the family expenses, and therewas hardly a princely house in Germany which did not send cooks to learntheir business in so magnificent a kitchen. The reputation of his tableremained undiminished for years. We find at a later period, that Philip, in the course of one of the nominal reconciliations which took placeseveral times between the monarch and William of Orange, wrote that, hishead cook being dead, he begged the Prince to "make him a present of hischief cook, Master Herman, who was understood to be very skilful. "

In this hospitable mansion, the feasting continued night and day. Fromearly morning till noon, the breakfast-tables were spread with wines andluxurious viands in constant succession, to all comers and at everymoment. --The dinner and supper were daily banquets for a multitude ofguests. The highest nobles were not those alone who were entertained. Menof lower degree were welcomed with a charming hospitality which made themfeel themselves at their ease. Contemporaries of all parties unite ineulogizing the winning address and gentle manners of the Prince. "Never, "says a most bitter Catholic historian, "did an arrogant or indiscreetword fall from his lips. He, upon no occasion, manifested anger to hisservants, however much they might be in fault, but contented himself withadmonishing them graciously, without menace or insult. He had a gentleand agreeable tongue, with which he could turn all the gentlemen at courtany way he liked. He was beloved and honored by the whole community. " Hismanner was graceful, familiar, caressing, and yet dignified. He had thegood breeding which comes from the heart, refined into an inexpressiblecharm from his constant intercourse, almost from his cradle, with mankindof all ranks. 

It may be supposed that this train of living was attended with expense. Moreover, he had various other establishments in town and country;besides his almost royal residence in Brussels. He was ardently fond ofthe chase, particularly of the knightly sport of falconry. In the countryhe "consoled himself by taking every day a heron in the clouds. " Hisfalconers alone cost him annually fifteen hundred florins, after he hadreduced their expenses to the lowest possible point. He was much in debt, even at this early period and with his princely fortune. "We come of arace, " he wrote carelessly to his brother Louis, "who are somewhat badmanagers in our young days, but when we grow older, we do better, likeour late father: 'sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper et insecula seculorum'. My greatest difficulty, " he adds, "as usual, is onaccount of the falconers. "

His debts already amounted, according to Granvelle's statement, to800, 000 or 900, 000 florins. He had embarrassed himself, not only throughhis splendid extravagance, by which all the world about him were made topartake of his wealth, but by accepting the high offices to which he hadbeen appointed. When general-in-chief on the frontier, his salary wasthree hundred florins monthly; "not enough, " as he said, "to pay theservants in his tent, " his necessary expenses being twenty-five hundredflorins, as appears by a letter to his wife. His embassy to carry thecrown to Ferdinand, and his subsequent residence as a hostage for thetreaty in Paris, were also very onerous, and he received no salary;according to the economical system in this respect pursued by Charles andPhilip. In these two embassies or missions alone, together with theentertainments offered by him to the court and to foreigners, after thepeace at Brussels, the Prince spent, according to his own estimate, 1, 500, 000 florins. He was, however, although deeply, not desperatelyinvolved, and had already taken active measures to regulate and reducehis establishment. His revenues were vast, both in his own right and inthat of his deceased wife. He had large claims upon the royal treasuryfor service and expenditure. He had besides ample sums to receive fromthe ransoms of the prisoners of St. Quentin and Gravelines, having servedin both campaigns. The amount to be received by individuals from thissource may be estimated from the fact that Count Horn, by no means one ofthe most favored in the victorious armies, had received from Leonord'Orleans, Due de Loggieville, a ransom of eighty thousand crowns. Thesum due, if payment were enforced, from the prisoners assigned to Egmont, Orange, and others, must have been very large. Granvelle estimated thewhole amount at two millions; adding, characteristically, "that this kindof speculation was a practice" which our good old fathers, lovers ofvirtue, would not have found laudable. In this the churchman was right, but he might have added that the "lovers of virtue" would have found itas little "laudable" for ecclesiastics to dispose of the sacred officesin their gift, for carpets, tapestry, and annual payments of certainpercentages upon the cure of souls. If the profits respectively gained bymilitary and clerical speculators in that day should be compared, thedisadvantage would hardly be found to lie with those of the long robe. 

Such, then, at the beginning of 1560, was William of Orange; a generous, stately, magnificent, powerful grandee. As a military commander, he hadacquitted himself very creditably of highly important functions at anearly age. Nevertheless it was the opinion of many persons, that he wasof a timid temperament. He was even accused of having manifested anunseemly panic at Philippeville, and of having only been restrained bythe expostulations of his officers, from abandoning both that fortressand Charlemont to Admiral Coligny, who had made his appearance in theneighborhood, merely at the head of a reconnoitring party. If the storywere true, it would be chiefly important as indicating that the Prince ofOrange was one of the many historical characters, originally of anexcitable and even timorous physical organization, whom moral courage anda strong will have afterwards converted into dauntless heroes. Certain itis that he was destined to confront open danger in every form, that hispath was to lead through perpetual ambush, yet that his cheerfulconfidence and tranquil courage were to become not only unquestionablebut proverbial. It may be safely asserted, however, that the story was aninvention to be classed with those fictions which made him the murdererof his first wife, a common conspirator against Philip's crown andperson, and a crafty malefactor in general, without a single virtue. Itmust be remembered that even the terrible Alva, who lived in harnessalmost from the cradle to the grave, was, so late as at this period, censured for timidity, and had been accused in youth of flat cowardice. He despised the insinuation, which for him had no meaning. There is nodoubt too that caution was a predominant characteristic of the Prince. Itwas one of the chief sources of his greatness. At that period, perhaps atany period, he would have been incapable of such brilliant and dashingexploits as had made the name of Egmont so famous. It had even become aproverb, "the counsel of Orange, the execution of Egmont, " yet we shallhave occasion to see how far this physical promptness which had been sofelicitous upon the battle-field was likely to avail the hero of St. Quentin in the great political combat which was approaching. 

As to the talents of the Prince, there was no difference of opinion. Hisenemies never contested the subtlety and breadth of his intellect, hisadroitness and capacity in conducting state affairs, his knowledge ofhuman nature, and the profoundness of his views. In many respects it mustbe confessed that his surname of The Silent, like many similarappellations, was a misnomer. William of Orange was neither "silent" nor"taciturn, " yet these are the epithets which will be forever associatedwith the name of a man who, in private, was the most affable, cheerful, and delightful of companions, and who on a thousand great publicoccasions was to prove himself, both by pen and by speech, the mosteloquent man of his age. His mental accomplishments were considerable: Hehad studied history with attention, and he spoke and wrote with facilityLatin, French, German, Flemish, and Spanish. 

The man, however, in whose hands the administration of the Netherlandswas in reality placed, was Anthony Perrenot, then Bishop of Arras, soonto be known by the more celebrated title of Cardinal Granvelle. He wasthe chief of the Consults, or secret council of three, by whosedeliberations the Duchess Regent was to be governed. His father, NicholasPerrenot, of an obscure family in Burgundy, had been long the favoriteminister and man of business to the Emperor Charles. Anthony, the eldestof thirteen children, was born in 1517. He was early distinguished forhis talents. He studied at Dole, Padua, Paris, and Louvain. At, the ageof twenty he spoke seven languages with perfect facility, while hisacquaintance with civil and ecclesiastical laws was consideredprodigious. At the age of twenty-three he became a canon of LiegeCathedral. The necessary eight quarters of gentility produced upon thatoccasion have accordingly been displayed by his panegyrists in triumphantrefutation of that theory which gave him a blacksmith for hisgrandfather. At the same period, although he had not reached therequisite age, the rich bishopric of Arras had already been prepared forhim by his father's care. Three years afterwards, in 1543, hedistinguished himself by a most learned and brilliant harangue before theCouncil of Trent, by which display he so much charmed the Emperor, thathe created him councillor of state. A few years afterwards he renderedthe unscrupulous Charles still more valuable proofs of devotion anddexterity by the part he played in the memorable imprisonment of theLandgrave of Hesse and the Saxon Dukes. He was thereafter constantlyemployed in embassies and other offices of trust and profit. 

There was no doubt as to his profound and varied learning, nor as to hisnatural quickness and dexterity. He was ready witted, smooth and fluentof tongue, fertile in expedients, courageous, resolute. He thoroughlyunderstood the art of managing men, particularly his superiors. He knewhow to govern under the appearance of obeying. He possessed exquisitetact in appreciating the characters of those far above him in rank andbeneath him in intellect. He could accommodate himself with greatreadiness to the idiosyncrasies of sovereigns. He was a chameleon to thehand which fed him. In his intercourse with the King, he colored himself, as it were, with the King's character. He was not himself, but Philip;not the sullen, hesitating, confused Philip, however, but Philip endowedwith eloquence, readiness, facility. The King ever found himselfanticipated with the most delicate obsequiousness, beheld his strugglingideas change into winged words without ceasing to be his own. No flatterycould be more adroit. The bishop accommodated himself to the King'sepistolary habits. The silver-tongued and ready debater substitutedprotocols for conversation, in deference to a monarch who could notspeak. He corresponded with Philip, with Margaret of Parma, with everyone. He wrote folios to the Duchess when they were in the same palace. Hewould write letters forty pages long to the King, and send off anothercourier on the same day with two or three additional despatches ofidentical date. Such prolixity enchanted the King, whose greediness forbusiness epistles was insatiable. The painstaking monarch toiled, pen inhand, after his wonderful minister in vain. Philip was only fit to be thebishop's clerk; yet he imagined himself to be the directing and governingpower. He scrawled apostilles in the margins to prove that he had readwith attention, and persuaded himself that he suggested when he scarcelyeven comprehended. The bishop gave advice and issued instructions when heseemed to be only receiving them. He was the substance while he affectedto be the shadow. These tactics were comparatively easy and likely to betriumphant, so long as he had only to deal with inferior intellects likethose of Philip and Margaret. When he should be matched against politicalgenius and lofty character combined, it was possible that his resourcesmight not prove so all-sufficient. 

His political principles were sharply defined in reality, but smoothedover by a conventional and decorous benevolence of language, whichdeceived vulgar minds. He was a strict absolutist. His deference toarbitrary power was profound and slavish. God and "the master, " as healways called Philip, he professed to serve with equal humility. "Itseems to me, " said he, in a letter of this epoch, "that I shall never beable to fulfil the obligation of slave which I owe to your majesty, towhom I am bound by so firm a chain;--at any rate, I shall never fail tostruggle for that end with sincerity. "

As a matter of course, he was a firm opponent of the national rights ofthe Netherlands, however artfully he disguised the sharp sword of violentabsolutism under a garland of flourishing phraseology. He had strenuouslywarned Philip against assembling the States-general before his departurefor the sake of asking them for supplies. He earnestly deprecatedallowing the constitutional authorities any control over the expendituresof the government, and averred that this practice under the Regent Maryhad been the cause of endless trouble. It may easily be supposed thatother rights were as little to his taste as the claim to vote thesubsidies, a privilege which was in reality indisputable. Men who stoodforth in defence of the provincial constitutions were, in his opinion, mere demagogues and hypocrites; their only motive being to curry favorwith the populace. Yet these charters were, after all, sufficientlylimited. The natural rights of man were topics which had never beenbroached. Man had only natural wrongs. None ventured to doubt thatsovereignty was heaven-born, anointed of God. The rights of theNetherlands were special, not general; plural, not singular; liberties, not liberty; "privileges, " not maxims. They were practical, nottheoretical; historical, not philosophical. Still, such as they were, they were facts, acquisitions. They had been purchased by the blood andtoil of brave ancestors; they amounted--however open to criticism uponbroad humanitarian grounds, of which few at that day had ever dreamed--toa solid, substantial dyke against the arbitrary power which was everchafing and fretting to destroy its barriers. No men were more subtle ormore diligent in corroding the foundation of these bulwarks than thedisciples of Granvelle. Yet one would have thought it possible totolerate an amount of practical freedom so different from the wild, social speculations which in later days, have made both tyrants andreasonable lovers of our race tremble with apprehension. TheNetherlanders claimed, mainly, the right to vote the money which wasdemanded in such enormous profusion from their painfully-acquired wealth;they were also unwilling to be burned alive if they objected totransubstantiation. Granvelle was most distinctly of an opposite opinionupon both topics. He strenuously deprecated the interference of thestates with the subsidies, and it was by his advice that the remorselessedict of 1550, the Emperor's ordinance of blood and fire, was re-enacted, as the very first measure of Philip's reign. Such were his sentiments asto national and popular rights by representation. For the peopleitself--"that vile and mischievous animal called the people"--as heexpressed it, he entertained a cheerful contempt. 

His aptitude for managing men was very great; his capacity for affairsincontestable; but it must be always understood as the capacity for theaffairs of absolutism. He was a clever, scheming politician, an adroitmanager; it remained to be seen whether he had a claim to the characterof a statesman. His industry was enormous. He could write fifty letters aday with his own hand. He could dictate to half a dozen amanuenses atonce, on as many different subjects, in as many different languages, andsend them all away exhausted. 

He was already rich. His income from his see and other livings wasestimated, in 1557, at ten thousand dollars--[1885 approximation. Thedecimal point more places to the right would in 2000 not be out of line. D. W. ]--; his property in ready money, "furniture, tapestry, and thelike, " at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. When it is consideredthat, as compared with our times, these sums represent a revenue of ahundred thousand, and a capital of two millions and a half in addition, it may be safely asserted that the prelate had at least made a goodbeginning. Besides his regular income, moreover, he had handsome receiptsfrom that simony which was reduced to a system, and which gave him aliberal profit, generally in the shape of an annuity, upon every beneficewhich he conferred. He was, however, by no means satisfied. His appetitewas as boundless as the sea; he was still a shameless mendicant ofpecuniary favors and lucrative offices. Already, in 1552, the Emperor hadroundly rebuked his greediness. "As to what you say of getting no'merced' nor 'ayuda de costa, '" said he, "'tis merced and ayuda de costaquite sufficient, when one has fat benefices, pensions, and salaries, with which a man might manage to support himself. " The bishop, however, was not easily abashed, and he was at the epoch which now occupies us, earnestly and successfully soliciting from Philip the lucrative abbey ofSaint Armand. Not that he would have accepted this preferment, "could theabbey have been annexed to any of the new bishoprics;" on the contrary, he assured the king that "to carry out so holy a work as the erection ofthose new sees, he would willingly have contributed even out of his ownmiserable pittance. "

It not being considered expedient to confiscate the abbey to anyparticular bishop, Philip accordingly presented it to the prelate ofArras, together with a handsome sum of money in the shape of an "ayuda decosta" beside. The thrifty bishop, who foresaw the advent of troubloustimes in the Netherlands, however, took care in the letters by which hesent his thanks, to instruct the King to secure the money upon crownproperty in Arragon, Naples, and Sicily, as matters in the provinces werebeginning to look very precarious. 

Such, at the commencement of the Duchess Margaret's administration, werethe characters and the previous histories of the persons into whose handsthe Netherlands were entrusted. None of them have been prejudged. We havecontented ourselves with stating the facts with regard to all, up to theperiod at which we have arrived. Their characters have been sketched, notaccording to subsequent developments, but as they appeared at the openingof this important epoch. 

The aspect of the country and its inhabitants offered many sharpcontrasts, and revealed many sources of future trouble. 

The aristocracy of the Netherlands was excessively extravagant, dissipated, and already considerably embarrassed in circumstances. It hadbeen the policy of the Emperor and of Philip to confer high offices, civil, military, and diplomatic, upon the leading nobles, by whichenormous expenses were entailed upon them, without any correspondingsalaries. The case of Orange has been already alluded to, and there weremany other nobles less able to afford the expense, who had been indulgedwith these ruinous honors. During the war, there had been, however, manychances of bettering broken fortunes. Victory brought immense prizes tothe leading officers. The ransoms of so many illustrious prisoners as hadgraced the triumphs of Saint Quentin and Gravelines had been extremelyprofitable. These sources of wealth had now been cut off; yet, on thedeparture of the King from the Netherlands, the luxury increased insteadof diminishing, "Instead of one court, " said a contemporary, "you wouldhave said that there were fifty. " Nothing could be more sumptuous thanthe modes of life in Brussels. The household of Orange has been alreadypainted. That of Egmont was almost as magnificent. A rivalry inhospitality and in display began among the highest nobles, and extendedto those less able to maintain themselves in the contest. During the warthere had been the valiant emulation of the battlefield; gentlemen hadvied with each other how best to illustrate an ancient name with deeds ofdesperate valor, to repair the fortunes of a ruined house with the spoilsof war. They now sought to surpass each other in splendid extravagance. It was an eager competition who should build the stateliest palaces, havethe greatest number of noble pages and gentlemen in waiting, the mostgorgeous liveries, the most hospitable tables, the most scientific cooks. There was, also, much depravity as well as extravagance. The morals ofhigh society were loose. Gaming was practised to a frightful extent. Drunkenness was a prevailing characteristic of the higher classes. Eventhe Prince of Orange himself, at this period, although never addicted tohabitual excess, was extremely convivial in his tastes, tolerating scenesand companions, not likely at a later day to find much favor in hissight. "We kept Saint Martin's joyously, " he wrote, at about this period, to his brother, "and in the most jovial company. Brederode was one day insuch a state that I thought he would certainly die, but he has now gotover it. " Count Brederode, soon afterwards to become so conspicuous inthe early scenes of the revolt, was, in truth, most notorious for hisperformances in these banqueting scenes. He appeared to have vowed asuncompromising hostility to cold water as to the inquisition, and alwaysdenounced both with the same fierce and ludicrous vehemence. Theirconstant connection with Germany at that period did not improve thesobriety of the Netherlands' nobles. The aristocracy of that country, asis well known, were most "potent at potting. " "When the German findshimself sober, " said the bitter Badovaro, "he believes himself to beill. " Gladly, since the peace, they had welcomed the opportunitiesafforded for many a deep carouse with their Netherlands cousins. Theapproaching marriage of the Prince of Orange with the Saxon princess--anepisode which will soon engage our attention--gave rise to tremendousorgies. Count Schwartzburg, the Prince's brother-in-law, and one of thenegotiators of the marriage, found many occasions to strengthen the bondsof harmony between the countries by indulgence of these common tastes. "Ihave had many princes and counts at my table, " he wrote to Orange, "wherea good deal more was drunk than eaten. The Rhinegrave's brother fell downdead after drinking too much malvoisie; but we have had him balsamed andsent home to his family. "

These disorders among the higher ranks were in reality so extensive as tojustify the biting remark of the Venetian: "The gentlemen intoxicatethemselves every day, " said he, "and the ladies also; but much less thanthe men. " His remarks as to the morality, in other respects, of bothsexes were equally sweeping, and not more complimentary. 

If these were the characteristics of the most distinguished society, itmay be supposed that they were reproduced with more or less intensitythroughout all the more remote but concentric circles of life, as far asthe seductive splendor of the court could radiate. The lesser noblesemulated the grandees, and vied with each other in splendidestablishments, banquets, masquerades, and equipages. The naturalconsequences of such extravagance followed. Their estates were mortgaged, deeply and more deeply; then, after a few years, sold to the merchants, or rich advocates and other gentlemen of the robe, to whom they had beenpledged. The more closely ruin stared the victims in the face, the moreheedlessly did they plunge into excesses. "Such were the circumstances, "moralizes a Catholic writer, "to which, at an earlier period, the affairsof Catiline, Cethegus, Lentulus, and others of that faction had beenreduced, when they undertook to overthrow the Roman republic. " Many ofthe nobles being thus embarrassed, and some even desperate, in theircondition, it was thought that they were desirous of creatingdisturbances in the commonwealth, that the payment of just debts might beavoided, that their mortgaged lands might be wrested by main force fromthe low-born individuals who had become possessed of them, that, inparticular, the rich abbey lands held by idle priests might beappropriated to the use of impoverished gentlemen who could turn them toso much better account. It is quite probable that interested motives suchas these were not entirely inactive among a comparatively small class ofgentlemen. The religious reformation in every land of Europe derived aportion of its strength from the opportunity it afforded to potentatesand great nobles for helping themselves to Church property. No doubt manyNetherlanders thought that their fortunes might be improved at theexpense of the monks, and for the benefit of religion. Even withoutapostasy from the mother Church, they looked with longing eyes on thewealth of her favored and indolent children. They thought that the Kingwould do well to carve a round number of handsome military commanderiesout of the abbey lands, whose possessors should be bound to militaryservice after the ancient manner of fiefs, so that a splendid cavalry, headed by the gentlemen of the country, should be ever ready to mount andride at the royal pleasure, in place of a horde of lazy epicureans, telling beads and indulging themselves in luxurious vice. 

Such views were entertained; such language often held. Thesecircumstances and sentiments had their influence among the causes whichproduced the great revolt now impending. Care should be taken, however, not to exaggerate that influence. It is a prodigious mistake to referthis great historical event to sources so insufficient as the ambition ofa few great nobles, and the embarrassments of a larger number of needygentlemen. The Netherlands revolt was not an aristocratic, but a popular, although certainly not a democratic movement. It was a great episode--thelongest, the darkest, the bloodiest, the most important episode in thehistory of the religious reformation in Europe. The nobles so conspicuousupon the surface at the outbreak, only drifted before a storm which theyneither caused nor controlled. Even the most powerful and the mostsagacious were tossed to and fro by the surge of great events, which, asthey rolled more and more tumultuously around them, seemed to become bothirresistible and unfathomable. 

For the state of the people was very different from the condition of thearistocracy. The period of martyrdom had lasted long and was to lastloner; but there were symptoms that it might one day be succeeded by amore active stage of popular disease. The tumults of the Netherlands werelong in ripening; when the final outbreak came it would have been morephilosophical to enquire, not why it had occurred, but how it could havebeen so long postponed. During the reign of Charles, the sixteenthcentury had been advancing steadily in strength as the once omnipotentEmperor lapsed into decrepitude. That extraordinary century had notdawned upon the earth only to increase the strength of absolutism andsuperstition. The new world had not been discovered, the ancient worldreconquered, the printing-press perfected, only that the inquisitionmight reign undisturbed over the fairest portions of the earth, andchartered hypocrisy fatten upon its richest lands. It was impossible thatthe most energetic and quick-witted people of Europe should not feelsympathy with the great effort made by Christendom to shake off theincubus which had so long paralyzed her hands and brain. In theNetherlands, where the attachment to Rome had never been intense, wherein the old times, the Bishops of Utrecht had been rather Ghibelline thanGuelph, where all the earlier sects of dissenters--Waldenses, Lollards, Hussites--had found numerous converts and thousands of martyrs, it wasinevitable that there should be a response from the popular heart to thedeeper agitation which now reached to the very core of Christendom. Inthose provinces, so industrious and energetic, the disgust was likely tobe most easily awakened for a system under which so many friars battenedin luxury upon the toils of others, contributing nothing to the taxation, nor to the military defence of the country, exercising no productiveavocation, except their trade in indulgences, and squandering in tavernsand brothels the annual sums derived from their traffic in licences tocommit murder, incest, and every other crime known to humanity. 

The people were numerous, industrious, accustomed for centuries to astate of comparative civil freedom, and to a lively foreign trade, bywhich their minds were saved from the stagnation of bigotry. It wasnatural that they should begin to generalize, and to pass from theconcrete images presented them in the Flemish monasteries to the abstractcharacter of Rome itself. The Flemish, above all their other qualities, were a commercial nation. Commerce was the mother of their freedom, sofar as they had acquired it, in civil matters. It was struggling to givebirth to a larger liberty, to freedom of conscience. The provinces weresituated in the very heart of Europe. The blood of a world-wide trafficwas daily coursing through the thousand arteries of that water-in-woventerritory. There was a mutual exchange between the Netherlands and allthe world; and ideas were as liberally interchanged as goods. Truth wasimported as freely as less precious merchandise. The psalms of Marot wereas current as the drugs of Molucca or the diamonds of Borneo. Theprohibitory measures of a despotic government could not annihilate thisintellectual trade, nor could bigotry devise an effective quarantine toexclude the religious pest which lurked in every bale of merchandise, andwas wafted on every breeze from East and West. 

The edicts of the Emperor had been endured, but not accepted. Thehorrible persecution under which so many thousands had sunk had producedits inevitable result. Fertilized by all this innocent blood, the soil ofthe Netherlands became as a watered garden, in which liberty, civil andreligious, was to flourish perennially. The scaffold had its dailyvictims, but did not make a single convert. The statistics of thesecrimes will perhaps never be accurately adjusted, nor will it beascertained whether the famous estimate of Grotius was an exaggerated oran inadequate calculation. Those who love horrible details may find amplematerial. The chronicles contain the lists of these obscure martyrs; buttheir names, hardly pronounced in their life-time, sound barbarously inour ears, and will never ring through the trumpet of fame. Yet they weremen who dared and suffered as much as men can dare and suffer in thisworld, and for the noblest cause which can inspire humanity. Fanaticsthey certainly were not, if fanaticism consists in show, withoutcorresponding substance. For them all was terrible reality. The Emperorand his edicts were realities, the axe, the stake were realities, and theheroism with which men took each other by the hand and walked into theflames, or with which women sang a song of triumph while the grave-diggerwas shovelling the earth upon their living faces, was a reality also. 

Thus, the people of the Netherlands were already pervaded, throughout thewhole extent of the country, with the expanding spirit of religiousreformation. It was inevitable that sooner or later an explosion was toarrive. They were placed between two great countries, where the newprinciples had already taken root. The Lutheranism of Germany and theCalvinism of France had each its share in producing the Netherlandrevolt, but a mistake is perhaps often made in estimating the relativeproportion of these several influences. The Reformation first entered theprovinces, not through the Augsburg, but the Huguenot gate. The fieryfield-preachers from the south of France first inflamed the excitablehearts of the kindred population of the south-western Netherlands. TheWalloons were the first to rebel against and the first to reconcilethemselves with papal Rome, exactly as their Celtic ancestors, fifteencenturies earlier, had been foremost in the revolt against imperial Rome, and precipitate in their submission to her overshadowing power. TheBatavians, slower to be moved but more steadfast, retained the impulsewhich they received from the same source which was already agitatingtheir "Welsh" compatriots. There were already French preachers atValenciennes and Tournay, to be followed, as we shall have occasion tosee, by many others. Without undervaluing the influence of the GermanChurches, and particularly of the garrison-preaching of the Germanmilitary chaplains in the Netherlands, it may be safely asserted that theearly Reformers of the provinces were mainly Huguenots in their belief:The Dutch Church became, accordingly, not Lutheran, but Calvinistic, andthe founder of the commonwealth hardly ceased to be a nominal Catholicbefore he became an adherent to the same creed. 

In the mean time, it is more natural to regard the great movement, psychologically speaking, as a whole, whether it revealed itself inFrance, Germany, the Netherlands, England, or Scotland. The policy ofgovernments, national character, individual interests, and othercollateral circumstances, modified the result; but the great cause wasthe same; the source of all the movements was elemental, natural, andsingle. The Reformation in Germany had been adjourned for half a centuryby the Augsburg religious peace, just concluded. It was held in suspensein France through the Macchiavellian policy which Catharine de Medici hadjust adopted, and was for several years to prosecute, of balancing oneparty against the other, so as to neutralize all power but her own. Thegreat contest was accordingly transferred to the Netherlands, to befought out for the rest of the century, while the whole of Christendomwere to look anxiously for the result. From the East and from the Westthe clouds rolled away, leaving a comparatively bright and peacefulatmosphere, only that they might concentrate themselves with portentousblackness over the devoted soil of the Netherlands. In Germany, theprinces, not the people, had conquered Rome, and to the princes, not thepeople, were secured the benefits of the victory--the spoils of churches, and the right to worship according to conscience. The people had theright to conform to their ruler's creed, or to depart from his land. Still, as a matter of fact, many of the princes being Reformers, a largemass of the population had acquired the privilege for their owngeneration and that of their children to practise that religion whichthey actually approved. This was a fact, and a more comfortable one thanthe necessity of choosing between what they considered wicked idolatryand the stake--the only election left to their Netherland brethren. InFrance, the accidental splinter from Montgomery's lance had deferred theHuguenot massacre for a dozen years. During the period in which the QueenRegent was resolved to play her fast and loose policy, all thepersuasions of Philip and the arts of Alva were powerless to induce herto carry out the scheme which Henry had revealed to Orange in the forestof Vincennes. When the crime came at last, it was as blundering as it wasbloody; at once premeditated and accidental; the isolated execution of aninterregal conspiracy, existing for half a generation, yet explodingwithout concert; a wholesale massacre, but a piecemeal plot. 

The aristocracy and the masses being thus, from a variety of causes, inthis agitated and dangerous condition, what were the measures of thegovernment?

The edict of 1550 had been re-enacted immediately after Philip'saccession to sovereignty. It is necessary that the reader should be madeacquainted with some of the leading provisions of this famous document, thus laid down above all the constitutions as the organic law of theland. A few plain facts, entirely without rhetorical varnish, will provemore impressive in this case than superfluous declamation. The Americanwill judge whether the wrongs inflicted by Laud and Charles upon hisPuritan ancestors were the severest which a people has had to undergo, and whether the Dutch Republic does not track its source to the samehigh, religious origin as that of our own commonwealth. 

"No one, " said the edict, "shall print, write, copy, keep, conceal, sell, buy or give in churches, streets, or other places, any book or writingmade by Martin Luther, John Ecolampadius, Ulrich Zwinglius, Martin Bucer, John Calvin, or other heretics reprobated by the Holy Church; nor break, or otherwise injure the images of the holy virgin or canonized saints. . . . Nor in his house hold conventicles, or illegal gatherings, or be presentat any such in which the adherents of the above-mentioned heretics teach, baptize, and form conspiracies against the Holy Church and the generalwelfare. . . . . Moreover, we forbid, " continues the edict, in name of thesovereign, "all lay persons to converse or dispute concerning the HolyScriptures, openly or secretly, especially on any doubtful or difficultmatters, or to read, teach, or expound the Scriptures, unless they haveduly studied theology and been approved by some renowned university. . . . . Or to preach secretly, or openly, or to entertain any of the opinions ofthe above-mentioned heretics. . . . . On pain, should anyone be found to havecontravened any of the points above-mentioned, as perturbators of ourstate and of the general quiet, to be punished in the following manner. "And how were they to be punished? What was the penalty inflicted upon theman or woman who owned a hymn-book, or who hazarded the opinion inprivate, that Luther was not quite wrong in doubting the power of a monkto sell for money the license to commit murder or incest; or upon theparent, not being a Roman Catholic doctor of divinity, who should readChrist's Sermon on the Mount to his children in his own parlor or shop?How were crimes like these to be visited upon the transgressor? Was it byreprimand, fine, imprisonment, banishment, or by branding on theforehead, by the cropping of the ears or the slitting of nostrils, as waspractised upon the Puritan fathers of New England for theirnonconformity? It was by a sharper chastisement than any of thesemethods. The Puritan fathers of the Dutch Republic had to struggleagainst a darker doom. The edict went on to provide--

"That such perturbators of the general quiet are to be executed, to wit:the men with the sword and the women to be buried alive, if they do notpersist in their errors; if they do persist in them, then they are to beexecuted with fire; all their property in both cases being confiscated tothe crown. "

Thus, the clemency of the sovereign permitted the repentant heretic to bebeheaded or buried, alive, instead of being burned. 

The edict further provided against all misprision of heresy by makingthose who failed to betray the suspected liable to the same punishment asif suspected or convicted themselves: "we forbid, " said the decree, "allpersons to lodge, entertain, furnish with food, fire, or clothing, orotherwise to favor any one holden or notoriously suspected of being aheretic;. . . And any one failing to denounce any such we ordain shallbe liable to the above-mentioned punishments. "

The edict went on to provide, "that if any person, being not convicted ofheresy or error, but greatly suspected thereof, and therefore condemnedby the spiritual judge to abjure such heresy, or by the secularmagistrate to make public fine and reparation, shall again becomesuspected or tainted with heresy--although it should not appear thathe has contravened or violated any one of our abovementionedcommands--nevertheless, we do will and ordain that such person shall beconsidered as relapsed, and, as such, be punished with loss of life andproperty, without any hope of moderation or mitigation of theabove-mentioned penalties. "

Furthermore, it was decreed, that "the spiritual judges, desiring toproceed against any one for the crime of heresy, shall request any of oursovereign courts or provincial councils to appoint any one of theircollege, or such other adjunct as the council shall select, to presideover the proceedings to be instituted against the suspected. All who knowof any person tainted with heresy are required to denounce and give themup to all judges, officers of the bishops, or others having authority onthe premises, on pain of being punished according to the pleasure of thejudge. Likewise, all shall be obliged, who know of any place where suchheretics keep themselves, to declare them to the authorities, on pain ofbeing held as accomplices, and punished as such heretics themselves wouldbe if apprehended. "

In order to secure the greatest number of arrests by a direct appeal tothe most ignoble, but not the least powerful principle of human nature, it was ordained "that the informer, in case of conviction, should beentitled to one half the property of the accused, if not more than onehundred pounds Flemish; if more, then ten per cent. Of all such excess. "

Treachery to one's friends was encouraged by the provision, "that if anyman being present at any secret conventicle, shall afterwards comeforward and betray his fellow-members of the congregation, he shallreceive full pardon. "

In order that neither the good people of the Netherlands, nor the judgesand inquisitors should delude themselves with the notion that thesefanatic decrees were only intended to inspire terror, not for practicalexecution, the sovereign continued to ordain--"to the end that the judgesand officers may have no reason, under pretext that the penalties are toogreat and heavy and only devised to terrify delinquents, to punish themless severely than they deserve--that the culprits be really punished bythe penalties above declared; forbidding all judges to alter or moderatethe penalties in any manner forbidding any one, of whatsoever condition, to ask of us, or of any one having authority, to grant pardon, or topresent any petition in favor of such heretics, exiles, or fugitives, onpenalty of being declared forever incapable of civil and military office, and of being, arbitrarily punished besides. "

Such were the leading provisions of this famous edict, originallypromulgated in 1550 as a recapitulation and condensation of all theprevious ordinances of the Emperor upon religious subjects. By its styleand title it was a perpetual edict, and, according to one of its clauses, was to be published forever, once in every six months, in every city andvillage of the Netherlands. It had been promulgated at Augsburg, wherethe Emperor was holding a diet, upon the 25th of September. Its severityhad so appalled the Dowager Queen of Hungary, that she had made a journeyto Augsburg expressly to procure a mitigation of some of its provisions. The principal alteration which she was able to obtain of the Emperor was, however, in the phraseology only. As a concession to popular, prejudice, the words "spiritual judges" were substituted for "inquisitors" whereverthat expression had occurred in the original draft. 

The edict had been re-enacted by the express advice of the Bishop ofArras, immediately on the accession of Philip: The prelate knew the valueof the Emperor's name; he may have thought, also, that it would bedifficult to increase the sharpness of the ordinances. "I advised theKing, " says Granvelle, in a letter written a few years later, "to make nochange in the placards, but to proclaim the text drawn up by the Emperor, republishing the whole as the King's edict, with express insertion of thephrase, 'Carolus, ' etc. I recommended this lest men should calumniate hisMajesty as wishing to introduce novelties in the matter of religion. "

This edict, containing the provisions which have been laid before thereader, was now to be enforced with the utmost rigor; every officialpersonage, from the stadholders down, having received the most stringentinstructions to that effect, under Philip's own hand. This was the firstgift of Philip and of Granvelle to the Netherlands; of the monarch whosaid of himself that he had always, "from the beginning of hisgovernment, followed the path of clemency, according to his naturaldisposition, so well known to all the world;" of the prelate who said ofhimself, "that he had ever combated the opinion that any thing could beaccomplished by terror, death, and violence. "

During the period of the French and Papal war, it has been seen that theexecution of these edicts had been permitted to slacken. It was nowresumed with redoubled fury. Moreover, a new measure had increased thedisaffection and dismay of the people, already sufficiently filled withapprehension. As an additional security for the supremacy of the ancientreligion, it had been thought desirable that the number of bishops shouldbe increased. There were but four sees in the Netherlands, those ofArras, Cambray, Tournay, and Utrecht. That of Utrecht was within thearchiepiscopate of Cologne; the other three were within that of Rheims. It seemed proper that the prelates of the Netherlands should owe noextraprovincial allegiance. It was likewise thought that three millionsof souls required more than four spiritual superintendents. At any rate, whatever might be the interest of the flocks, it was certain that thosebroad and fertile pastures would sustain more than the present number ofshepherds. The wealth of the religious houses in the provinces was verygreat. The abbey of Afflighem alone had a revenue of fifty thousandflorins, and there were many others scarcely inferior in wealth. Butthese institutions were comparatively independent both of King and Pope. Electing their own superiors from time to time, in nowise desirous of anychange by which their ease might be disturbed and their richesendangered, the honest friars were not likely to engage in any veryvigorous crusade against heresy, nor for the sake of introducing orstrengthening Spanish institutions, which they knew to be abominated bythe people, to take the risk, of driving all their disciples into revoltand apostacy. Comforting themselves with an Erasmian philosophy, whichthey thought best suited to the times, they were as little likely as theSage of Rotterdam himself would have been, to make martyrs of themselvesfor the sake of extirpating Calvinism. The abbots and monks were, inpolitical matters, very much under the influence of the great nobles, inwhose company they occupied the benches of the upper house of theStates-general. 

Doctor Francis Sonnius had been sent on a mission to the Pope, for thepurpose of representing the necessity of an increase in the episcopalforce of the Netherlands. Just as the King was taking his departure, thecommissioner arrived, bringing with him the Bull of Paul the Fourth, dated May 18, 1559. This was afterwards confirmed by that of Pius theFourth, in January of the following year. The document stated that "Paulthe Fourth, slave of slaves, wishing to provide for the welfare of theprovinces and the eternal salvation of their inhabitants, had determinedto plant in that fruitful field several new bishoprics. The enemy ofmankind being abroad, " said the Bull, "in so many forms at thatparticular time, and the Netherlands, then under the sway of that belovedson of his holiness, Philip the Catholic, being compassed about withheretic and schismatic nations, it was believed that the eternal welfareof the land was in great danger. At the period of the originalestablishment of Cathedral churches, the provinces had been sparselypeopled; they had now become filled to overflowing, so that the originalecclesiastical arrangement did not suffice. The harvest was plentiful, but the laborers were few. "

In consideration of these and other reasons, three archbishoprics wereaccordingly appointed. That of Mechlin was to be principal, under whichwere constituted six bishoprics, those, namely, of Antwerp, Bois le Due, Rurmond, Ghent, Bruges and Ypres. That of Cambray was second, with thefour subordinate dioceses of Tournay, Arras, Saint Omer and Namur. Thethird archbishopric was that of Utrecht, with the five sees of Haarlem, Middelburg, Leeuwarden, Groningen and Deventer. 

The nomination to these important offices was granted to the King, subject to confirmation by the Pope. Moreover, it was ordained by theBull that "each bishop should appoint nine additional prebendaries, whowere to assist him in the matter of the inquisition throughout hisbishopric, two of whom were themselves to be inquisitors. "

To sustain these two great measures, through which Philip hoped once andforever to extinguish the Netherland heresy, it was considered desirablethat the Spanish troops still remaining in the provinces, should be keptthere indefinitely. 

The force was not large, amounting hardly to four thousand men, but theywere unscrupulous, and admirably disciplined. As the entering wedge, bywhich a military and ecclesiastical despotism was eventually to be forcedinto the very heart of the land, they were invaluable. The moral effectto be hoped from the regular presence of a Spanish standing army during atime of peace in the Netherlands could hardly be exaggerated. Philip wastherefore determined to employ every argument and subterfuge to detainthe troops. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Burned alive if they objected to transubstantiation German finds himself sober--he believes himself ill Govern under the appearance of obeying Informer, in case of conviction, should be entitled to one half Man had only natural wrongs (No natural rights) No calumny was too senseless to be invented Ruinous honors Sovereignty was heaven-born, anointed of God That vile and mischievous animal called the people Understood the art of managing men, particularly his superiors Upon one day twenty-eight master cooks were dismissed William of Nassau, Prince of Orange

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 6. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER II. 1560-1561

 Agitation in the Netherlands--The ancient charters resorted to as barriers against the measures of government--"Joyous entrance" of Brabant--Constitution of Holland--Growing unpopularity of Antony Perrenot, Archbishop of Mechlin--Opposition to the new bishoprics, by Orange, Egmont, and other influential nobles--Fury of the people at the continued presence of the foreign soldiery--Orange resigns the command of the legion--The troops recalled--Philip's personal attention to the details of persecution--Perrenot becomes Cardinal de Granvelle--All the power of government in his hands--His increasing unpopularity--Animosity and violence of Egmont towards the Cardinal--Relations between Orange and Granvelle--Ancient friendship gradually changing to enmity--Renewal of the magistracy at Antwerp--Quarrel between the Prince and Cardinal--Joint letter of Orange and Egmont to the King--Answer of the King--Indignation of Philip against Count Horn--Secret correspondence between the King and Cardinal--Remonstrances against the new bishoprics--Philip's private financial statements--Penury of the exchequer in Spain and in the provinces--Plan for debasing the coin--Marriage of William the Silent with the Princess of Lorraine circumvented--Negotiations for his matrimonial alliance with Princess Anna of Saxony-- Correspondence between Granvelle and Philip upon the subject-- Opposition of Landgrave Philip and of Philip the Second--Character and conduct of Elector Augustus--Mission of Count Schwartzburg-- Communications of Orange to the King and to Duchess Margaret-- Characteristic letter of Philip--Artful conduct of Granvelle and of the Regent--Visit of Orange to Dresden--Proposed "note" of Elector Augustus--Refusal of the Prince--Protest of the Landgrave against the marriage--Preparations for the wedding at Leipzig--Notarial instrument drawn up on the marriage day--Wedding ceremonies and festivities--Entrance of Granvelle into Mechlin as Archbishop-- Compromise in Brabant between the abbeys and bishops. 

The years 1560 and 1561 were mainly occupied with the agitation anddismay produced by the causes set forth in the preceding chapter. 

Against the arbitrary policy embodied in the edicts, the new bishopricsand the foreign soldiery, the Netherlanders appealed to their ancientconstitutions. These charters were called "handvests" in the vernacularDutch and Flemish, because the sovereign made them fast with his hand. Asalready stated, Philip had made them faster than any of the princes ofhis house had ever done, so far as oath and signature could accomplishthat purpose, both as hereditary prince in 1549, and as monarch in 1555. The reasons for the extensive and unconditional manner in which he sworeto support the provincial charters, have been already indicated. 

Of these constitutions, that of Brabant, known by the title of the'joyeuse entree, blyde inkomst', or blithe entrance, furnished the mostdecisive barrier against the present wholesale tyranny. First andforemost, the "joyous entry" provided "that the prince of the land shouldnot elevate the clerical state higher than of old has been customary andby former princes settled; unless by consent of the other two estates, the nobility and the cities. "

Again; "the prince can prosecute no one of his subjects nor any foreignresident, civilly or criminally, except in the ordinary and open courtsof justice in the province, where the accused may answer and defendhimself with the help of advocates. "

Further; "the prince shall appoint no foreigners to office in Brabant. "

Lastly; "should the prince, by force or otherwise, violate any of theseprivileges, the inhabitants of Brabant, after regular protest entered, are discharged of their oaths of allegiance, and as free, independent andunbound people, may conduct themselves exactly as seems to them best. "

Such were the leading features, so far as they regarded the points now atissue, of that famous constitution which was so highly esteemed in theNetherlands, that mothers came to the province in order to give birth totheir children, who might thus enjoy, as a birthright, the privileges ofBrabant. Yet the charters of the other provinces ought to have been aseffective against the arbitrary course of the government. "No foreigner, "said the constitution of Holland, "is eligible as, councillor, financier, magistrate, or member of a court. Justice can be administered only by theordinary tribunals and magistrates. The ancient laws and customs shallremain inviolable. Should the prince infringe any of these provisions, noone is bound to obey him. "

These provisions, from the Brabant and Holland charters, are only citedas illustrative of the general spirit of the provincial constitutions. Nearly all the provinces possessed privileges equally ample, duly signedand sealed. So far as ink and sealing wax could defend a land againstsword and fire, the Netherlands were impregnable against the edicts andthe renewed episcopal inquisition. Unfortunately, all history shows howfeeble are barriers of paper or lambskin, even when hallowed with amonarch's oath, against the torrent of regal and ecclesiasticalabsolutism. It was on the reception in the provinces of the new andconfirmatory Bull concerning the bishoprics, issued in January, 1560, that the measure became known, and the dissatisfaction manifest. Thediscontent was inevitable and universal. The ecclesiastical establishmentwhich was not to be enlarged or elevated but by consent of the estates, was suddenly expanded into three archiepiscopates and fifteen bishoprics. The administration of justice, which was only allowed in free and localcourts, distinct for each province, was to be placed, so far as regardedthe most important of human interests, in the hands of bishops and theircreatures, many of them foreigners and most of them monks. The lives andproperty of the whole population were to be at the mercy of these utterlyirresponsible conclaves. All classes were outraged. The nobles wereoffended because ecclesiastics, perhaps foreign ecclesiastics, were to beempowered to sit in the provincial estates and to control theirproceedings in place of easy, indolent, ignorant abbots and friars, whohad generally accepted the influence of the great seignors. The priestswere enraged because the religious houses were thus taken out of theircontrol and confiscated to a bench of bishops, usurping the places ofthose superiors who had formally been elected by and among themselves. The people were alarmed because the monasteries, although not respectednor popular, were at least charitable and without ambition to exerciseecclesiastical cruelty; while, on the other hand, by the new episcopalarrangements, a force of thirty new inquisitors was added to theapparatus for enforcing orthodoxy already established. The odium of themeasure was placed upon the head of that churchman, already appointedArchbishop of Mechlin, and soon to be known as Cardinal Granvelle. Fromthis time forth, this prelate began to be regarded with a dailyincreasing aversion. He was looked upon as the incarnation of all theodious measures which had been devised; as the source of that policy ofabsolutism which revealed itself more and more rapidly after the King'sdeparture from the country. It was for this reason that so much stresswas laid by popular clamor upon the clause prohibiting foreigners fromoffice. Granvelle was a Burgundian; his father had passed most of hisactive life in Spain, while both he and his more distinguished son wereidentified in the general mind with Spanish politics. To this prelate, then, were ascribed the edicts, the new bishoprics, and the continuedpresence of the foreign troops. The people were right as regarded thefirst accusation. They were mistaken as to the other charges. 

The King had not consulted Anthony Perrenot with regard to the creationof the new bishoprics. The measure, which had been successivelycontemplated by Philip "the Good, " by Charles the Bold, and by theEmperor Charles, had now been carried out by Philip the Second, withoutthe knowledge of the new Archbishop of Mechlin. The King had for oncebeen able to deceive the astuteness of the prelate, and had concealedfrom him the intended arrangement, until the arrival of Sonnius with theBulls. Granvelle gave the reasons for this mystery with much simplicity. "His Majesty knew, " he said, "that I should oppose it, as it was morehonorable and lucrative to be one of four than one of eighteen. " In fact, according to his own statement, he lost money by becoming archbishop ofMechlin, and ceasing to be Bishop of Arras. For these reasons hedeclined, more than once, the proffered dignity, and at last onlyaccepted it from fear of giving offence to the King, and after havingsecured compensation for his alleged losses. In the same letter (of 29thMay, 1560) in which he thanked Philip for conferring upon him the richabbey of Saint Armand, which he had solicited, in addition to the"merced" in ready money, concerning the safe investment of which he hadalready sent directions, he observed that he was now willing to acceptthe archbishopric of Mechlin; notwithstanding the odium attached to themeasure, notwithstanding his feeble powers, and notwithstanding that, during the life of the Bishop of Tournay, who was then in rude health, hecould only receive three thousand ducats of the revenue, giving up Arrasand gaining nothing in Mechlin; notwithstanding all this, and a thousandother things besides, he assured his Majesty that, "since the royaldesire was so strong that he should accept, he would consider nothing sodifficult that he would not at least attempt it. " Having made up his mindto take the see and support the new arrangements, he was resolved thathis profits should be as large as possible. We have seen how he hadalready been enabled to indemnify himself. We shall find him soonafterwards importuning the King for the Abbey of Afflighem, the enormousrevenue of which the prelate thought would make another handsome additionto the rewards of his sacrifices. At the same time, he was most anxiousthat the people, and particularly the great nobles, should not ascribethe new establishment to him, as they persisted in doing. "They say thatthe episcopates were devised to gratify my ambition, " he wrote to Philiptwo years later; "whereas your Majesty knows how steadily I refused thesee of Mechlin, and that I only accepted it in order not to live inidleness, doing nothing for God and your Majesty. " He thereforeinstructed Philip, on several occasions, to make it known to thegovernment of the Regent, to the seignors, and to the country generally, that the measure had been arranged without his knowledge; that theMarquis Berghen had known of it first, and that the prelate had, intruth, been kept in the dark on the subject until the arrival of Sonniuswith the Bulls. The King, always docile to his minister, accordinglywrote to the Duchess the statements required, in almost the exactphraseology suggested; taking pains to repeat the declarations on severaloccasions, both by letter and by word of mouth, to many influentialpersons. 

The people, however, persisted in identifying the Bishop with the scheme. They saw that he was the head of the new institutions; that he was toreceive the lion's share of the confiscated abbeys, and that he wasforemost in defending and carrying through the measure, in spite of allopposition. That opposition waxed daily more bitter, till the Cardinal, notwithstanding that he characterised the arrangement to the King as "aholy work, " and warmly assured Secretary Perez that he would contributehis fortune, his blood, and his life, to its success, was yet obliged toexclaim in the bitterness of his spirit, "Would to God that the erectionof these new sees had never been thought of. Amen! Amen!"

Foremost in resistance was the Prince of Orange. Although a Catholic, hehad no relish for the horrible persecution which had been determinedupon. The new bishoprics he characterized afterwards as parts "of onegrand scheme for establishing the cruel inquisition of Spain; the saidbishops to serve as inquisitors, burners of bodies; and tyrants ofconscience: two prebendaries in each see being actually constitutedinquisitors. " For this reason he omitted no remonstrance on the subjectto the Duchess, to Granvelle, and by direct letters to the King. Hisefforts were seconded by Egmont, Berghen, and other influential nobles. Even Berlaymont was at first disposed to side with the opposition, butupon the argument used by the Duchess, that the bishoprics and prebendswould furnish excellent places for his sons and other members of thearistocracy, he began warmly to support the measure. Most of the labor, however, and all the odium, of the business fell upon the Bishop'sshoulders. There was still a large fund of loyalty left in the popularmind, which not even forty years of the Emperor's dominion had consumed, and which Philip was destined to draw upon as prodigally as if thetreasure had been inexhaustible. For these reasons it still seemed mostdecorous to load all the hatred upon the minister's back, and to retainthe consolatory formula, that Philip was a prince, "clement, benign, anddebonair. "

The Bishop, true to his habitual conviction, that words, with the people, are much more important than things, was disposed to have the word"inquisitor" taken out of the text of the new decree. He was anxious atthis juncture to make things pleasant, and he saw no reason why menshould be unnecessarily startled. If the inquisition could be practised, and the heretics burned, he was in favor of its being done comfortably. The word "inquisitor" was unpopular, almost indecent. It was better tosuppress the term and retain the thing. "People are afraid to speak ofthe new bishoprics, " he wrote to Perez, "on account of the clauseproviding that of nine canons one shall be inquisitor. Hence people fearthe Spanish inquisition. "--He, therefore, had written to the King tosuggest instead, that the canons or graduates should be obliged to assistthe Bishop, according as he might command. Those terms would suffice, because, although not expressly stated, it was clear that the Bishop wasan ordinary inquisitor; but it was necessary to expunge words that gaveoffence. 

It was difficult, however, with all the Bishop's eloquence and dexterity, to construct an agreeable inquisition. The people did not like it, in anyshape, and there were indications, not to be mistaken, that one day therewould be a storm which it would be beyond human power to assuage. Atpresent the people directed their indignation only upon a part of themachinery devised for their oppression. The Spanish troops wereconsidered as a portion of the apparatus by which the new bishoprics andthe edicts were to be forced into execution. Moreover, men were, weary ofthe insolence and the pillage which these mercenaries had so longexercised in the land. When the King had been first requested to withdrawthem, we have seen that he had burst into a violent passion. He hadafterward dissembled. Promising, at last, that they should all be sentfrom the country within three or four months after his departure, he haddetermined to use every artifice to detain them in the provinces. He hadsucceeded, by various subterfuges, in keeping them there fourteen months;but it was at last evident that their presence would no longer betolerated. Towards the close of 1560 they were quartered in Walcheren andBrill. The Zelanders, however, had become so exasperated by theirpresence that they resolutely refused to lay a single hand upon thedykes, which, as usual at that season, required great repairs. Ratherthan see their native soil profaned any longer by these hated foreignmercenaries, they would see it sunk forever in the ocean. They swore toperish-men, women, and children together-in the waves, rather than endurelonger the outrages which the soldiery daily inflicted. Such was thetemper of the Zelanders that it was not thought wise to trifle with theirirritation. The Bishop felt that it was no longer practicable to detainthe troops, and that all the pretext devised by Philip and his governmenthad become ineffectual. In a session of the State Council, held on the25th October, 1560, he represented in the strongest terms to the Regentthe necessity for the final departure of the troops. Viglius, who knewthe character of his countrymen, strenuously seconded the proposal. Orange briefly but firmly expressed the same opinion, declining anylonger to serve as commander of the legion, an office which, inconjunction with Egmont, he had accepted provisionally, with the best ofmotives, and on the pledge of Philip that the soldiers should bewithdrawn. The Duchess urged that the order should at least be deferreduntil the arrival of Count Egmont, then in Spain, but the proposition wasunanimously negatived. 

Letters were accordingly written, in the name of the Regent, to the King. It was stated that the measure could no longer be delayed, that theprovinces all agreed in this point, that so long as the foreignersremained not a stiver should be paid into the treasury; that if they hadonce set sail, the necessary amount for their arrears would be furnishedto the government; but that if they should return it was probable thatthey would be resisted by the inhabitants with main force, and that theywould only be allowed to enter the cities through a breach in their wall. It was urged, moreover, that three or four thousand Spaniards would notbe sufficient to coerce all the provinces, and that there was not moneyenough in the royal exchequer to pay the wages of a single company of thetroops. "It cuts me to the heart, " wrote the Bishop to Philip, "to seethe Spanish infantry leave us; but go they must. Would to God that wecould devise any pretext, as your Majesty desires, under which to keepthem here! We have tried all means humanly possible for retaining them, but I see no way to do it without putting the provinces in manifestdanger of sudden revolt. "

Fortunately for the dignity of the government, or for the repose of thecountry, a respectable motive was found for employing the legionelsewhere. The important loss which Spain had recently met with in thecapture of Zerby made a reinforcement necessary in the army engaged inthe Southern service. Thus, the disaster in Barbary at last relieved theNetherlands of the pest which had afflicted them so long. For a briefbreathing space the country was cleared of foreign mercenaries. 

The growing unpopularity of the royal government, still typified, however, in the increasing hatred entertained for the Bishop, was notmaterially diminished by the departure of the Spaniards. The edicts andthe bishoprics were still there, even if the soldiers were gone. Thechurchman worked faithfully to accomplish his master's business. Philip, on his side, was industrious to bring about the consummation of hismeasures. Ever occupied with details, the monarch, from his palace inSpain, sent frequent informations against the humblest individuals in theNetherlands. It is curious to observe the minute reticulations of tyrannywhich he had begun already to spin about a whole, people, while cold, venomous, and patient he watched his victims from the centre of his web. He forwarded particular details to the Duchess and Cardinal concerning avariety of men and women, sending their names, ages, personal appearance, occupations, and residence, together with directions for their immediateimmolation. Even the inquisitors of Seville were set to work to increase, by means of their branches or agencies in the provinces, the royalinformation on this all-important subject. "There are but few of us leftin the world, " he moralized in a letter to the Bishop, "who care forreligion. 'Tis necessary, therefore, for us to take the greater heed forChristianity. We must lose our all, if need be, in order to do our duty;in fine, " added he, with his usual tautology, "it is right that a manshould do his duty. "

Granvelle--as he must now be called, for his elevation to thecardinalship will be immediately alluded to--wrote to assure the Kingthat every pains would be taken to ferret out and execute the individualscomplained of. He bewailed, however, the want of heartiness on the partof the Netherland inquisitors and judges. "I find, " said he, "that alljudicial officers go into the matter of executing the edicts withreluctance, which I believe is caused by their fear of displeasing thepopulace. When they do act they do it but languidly, and when thesematters are not taken in hand with the necessary liveliness, the fruitdesired is not gathered. We do not fail to exhort and to command them todo their work. " He added that Viglius and Berlaymont displayed laudablezeal, but that he could not say as much for the Council of Brabant. Thosecouncillors "were forever prating, " said he, "of the constitutionalrights of their province, and deserved much less commendation. "

The popularity of the churchman, not increased by these desperateexertions to force an inhuman policy upon an unfortunate nation, receivedlikewise no addition from his new elevation in rank. During the latterpart of the year 1560, Margaret of Parma, who still entertained aprofound admiration of the prelate, and had not yet begun to chafe underhis smooth but imperious dominion, had been busy in preparing for him adelightful surprise. Without either his knowledge or that of the King, she had corresponded with the Pope, and succeeded in obtaining, as apersonal favor to herself, the Cardinal's hat for Anthony Perrenot. InFebruary, 1561, Cardinal Borromeo wrote to announce that the coveteddignity had been bestowed. The Duchess hastened, with joyous alacrity, tocommunicate the intelligence to the Bishop, but was extremely hurt tofind that he steadily refused to assume his new dignity, until he hadwritten to the King to announce the appointment, and to ask hispermission to accept the honor. The Duchess, justly wounded at hisrefusal to accept from her hands the favor which she, and she only, hadobtained for him, endeavored in vain to overcome his pertinacity. Sherepresented that although Philip was not aware of the application or theappointment, he was certain to regard it as an agreeable surprise. Sheurged, moreover, that his temporary refusal would be misconstrued atRome, where it would certainly excite ridicule, and very possibly giveoffence in the highest quarter. The Bishop was inexorable. He feared, says his panegyrist, that he might one day be on worse terms than atpresent with the Duchess, and that then she might reproach him with herformer benefits. He feared also that the King might, in consequence ofthe step, not look with satisfaction upon him at some future period, whenhe might stand in need of his favors. He wrote, accordingly, a mostcharacteristic letter to Philip, in which he informed him that he hadbeen honored with the Cardinal's hat. He observed that many persons werealready congratulating him, but that before he made any demonstration ofaccepting or refusing, he waited for his Majesty's orders: upon his willhe wished ever to depend. He also had the coolness, under thecircumstances, to express his conviction that "it was his Majesty who hadsecretly procured this favor from his Holiness. "

The King received the information very graciously, observing in reply, that although he had never made any suggestion of the kind, he had "oftenthought upon the subject. " The royal command was of course at oncetransmitted, that the dignity should be accepted. By special favor, moreover, the Pope dispensed the new Cardinal from the duty of going toRome in person, and despatched his chamberlain, Theophilus Friso, toBrussels, with the red hat and tabbard. 

The prelate, having thus reached the dignity to which he had longaspired, did not grow more humble in his deportment, or less zealous inthe work through which he had already gained so much wealth andpreferment. His conduct with regard to the edicts and bishoprics hadalready brought him into relations which were far from amicable with hiscolleagues in the council. More and more he began to take the control ofaffairs into his own hand. The consulta, or secret committee of the statecouncil, constituted the real government of the country. Here the mostimportant affairs were decided upon without the concurrence of the otherseignors, Orange, Egmont, and Glayon, who, at the same time, were heldresponsible for the action of government. The Cardinal was smooth inmanner, plausible of speech, generally even-tempered, but he wasoverbearing and blandly insolent. Accustomed to control royal personages, under the garb of extreme obsequiousness, he began, in his intercoursewith those of less exalted rank, to omit a portion of the subserviencywhile claiming a still more undisguised authority. To nobles like Egmontand Orange, who looked down upon the son of Nicolas Perrenot and NicolaBonvalot as a person immeasurably beneath themselves in the socialhierarchy, this conduct was sufficiently irritating. The Cardinal, placedas far above Philip, and even Margaret, in mental power as he was beneaththem in worldly station, found it comparatively easy to deal with themamicably. With such a man as Egmont, it was impossible for the churchmanto maintain friendly relations. The Count, who notwithstanding hisromantic appearance, his brilliant exploits, and his interesting destiny, was but a commonplace character, soon conceived a mortal aversion toGranvelle. A rude soldier, entertaining no respect for science orletters, ignorant and overbearing, he was not the man to submit to theairs of superiority which pierced daily more and more decidedly throughthe conventional exterior of the Cardinal. Granvelle, on the other hand, entertained a gentle contempt for Egmont, which manifested itself in allhis private letters to the King, and was sufficiently obvious in hisdeportment. There had also been distinct causes of animosity betweenthem. The governorship of Hesdin having become vacant, Egmont, backed byOrange and other nobles, had demanded it for the Count de Roeulx, agentleman of the Croy family, who, as well as his father, had renderedmany important services to the crown. The appointment was, however, bestowed, through Granvelle's influence, upon the Seigneur d'Helfault, agentleman of mediocre station and character, who was thought to possessno claims whatever to the office. Egmont, moreover, desired the abbey ofTrulle for a poor relation of his own; but the Cardinal, to whom nothingin this way ever came amiss, had already obtained the King's permissionto, appropriate the abbey to himself Egmont was now furious against theprelate, and omitted no opportunity of expressing his aversion, both inhis presence and behind his back. On one occasion, at least, his wrathexploded in something more than words. Exasperated by Granvelle'spolished insolence in reply to his own violent language, he drew hisdagger upon him in the presence of the Regent herself, "and, " says acontemporary, "would certainly have sent the Cardinal into the next worldhad he not been forcibly restrained by the Prince of Orange and otherpersons present, who warmly represented to him that such griefs were tobe settled by deliberate advice, not by choler. " At the same time, whilescenes like these were occurring in the very bosom of the state council, Granvelle, in his confidential letters to secretary Perez, assertedwarmly that all reports of a want of harmony between himself and theother seignors and councillors were false, and that the best relationsexisted among them all. It was not his intention, before it should benecessary, to let the King doubt his ability to govern the counselaccording to the secret commission with which he had been invested. 

His relations with Orange were longer in changing from friendship to openhostility. In the Prince the Cardinal met his match. He found himselfconfronted by an intellect as subtle, an experience as fertile inexpedients, a temper as even, and a disposition sometimes as haughty ashis own. He never affected to undervalue the mind of Orange. "'Tis a manof profound genius, vast ambition--dangerous, acute, politic, " he wroteto the King at a very early period. The original relations betweenhimself and the Prince bad been very amicable. It hardly needed theprelate's great penetration to be aware that the friendship of so exalteda personage as the youthful heir to the principality of Orange, and tothe vast possessions of the Chalons-Nassau house in Burgundy and theNetherlands, would be advantageous to the ambitious son of the BurgundianCouncillor Granvelle. The young man was the favorite of the Emperor fromboyhood; his high rank, and his remarkable talents marked himindisputably for one of the foremost men of the coming reign. Thereforeit was politic in Perrenot to seize every opportunity of making himselfuseful to the Prince. He busied himself with securing, so far as it mightbe necessary to secure, the succession of William to his cousin'sprincipality. It seems somewhat ludicrous for a merit to be made not onlyfor Granvelle but for the Emperor, that the Prince should have beenallowed to take an inheritance which the will of Rene de Nassau mostunequivocally conferred, and which no living creature disputed. Yet, because some of the crown lawyers had propounded the dogma that "the sonOf a heretic ought not to succeed, " it was gravely stated as an immenseact of clemency upon the part of Charles the Fifth that he had notconfiscated the whole of the young Prince's heritage. In returnGranvelle's brother Jerome had obtained the governorship of the youth, upon whose majority he had received an honorable military appointmentfrom his attached pupil. The prelate had afterwards recommended themarriage with the Count de Buren's heiress, and had used his influencewith the Emperor to overcome certain objections entertained by Charles, that the Prince, by this great accession of wealth, might be growing toopowerful. On the other hand, there were always many poor relations anddependents of Granvelle, eager to be benefitted by Orange's patronage, who lived in the Prince's household, or received handsome appointmentsfrom his generosity. Thus, there had been great intimacy, founded uponvarious benefits mutually conferred; for it could hardly be asserted thatthe debt of friendship was wholly upon one side. 

When Orange arrived in Brussels from a journey, he would go to thebishop's before alighting at his own house. When the churchman visitedthe Prince, he entered his bed-chamber without ceremony before he hadrisen; for it was William's custom, through life, to receive intimateacquaintances, and even to attend to important negotiations of state, while still in bed. 

The show of this intimacy had lasted longer than its substance. Granvellewas the most politic of men, and the Prince had not served hisapprenticeship at the court of Charles the Fifth to lay himself bareprematurely to the criticism or the animosity of the Cardinal with therecklessness of Horn and Egmont. An explosion came at last, however, andvery soon after an exceedingly amicable correspondence between the twoupon the subject of an edict of religious amnesty which Orange waspreparing for his principality, and which Granvelle had recommended himnot to make too lenient. A few weeks after this, the Antwerp magistracywas to be renewed. The Prince, as hereditary burgrave of that city, wasentitled to a large share of the appointing power in these politicalarrangements, which at the moment were of great importance. The citizensof Antwerp were in a state of excitement on the subject of the newbishops. They openly, and in the event, successfully resisted theinstallation of the new prelate for whom their city had been constituteda diocese. The Prince was known to be opposed to the measure, and to thewhole system of ecclesiastical persecution. When the nominations for thenew magistracy came before the Regent, she disposed of the whole matterin the secret consulta, without the knowledge, and in a manner opposed tothe views of Orange. He was then furnished with a list of the newmagistrates, and was informed that he had been selected as commissioneralong with Count Aremberg, to see that the appointments were carried intoeffect. The indignation of the Prince was extreme. He had already takenoffence at some insolent expressions upon this topic, which the Cardinalhad permitted himself. He now sent back the commission to the Duchess, adding, it was said, that he was not her lackey, and that she might sendsome one else with her errands. The words were repeated in the statecouncil. There was a violent altercation--Orange vehemently resenting hisappointment merely to carry out decisions in which he claimed an originalvoice. His ancestors, he said, had often changed the whole of the Antwerpmagistracy by their own authority. It was a little too much that thismatter, as well as every other state affair, should be controlled by thesecret committee of which the Cardinal was the chief. Granvelle, on hisside, was also in a rage. He flung from the council-chamber, summoned theChancellor of Brabant, and demanded, amid bitter execrations againstOrange, what common and obscure gentleman there might be, whom he couldappoint to execute the commission thus refused by the Prince and byAremberg. He vowed that in all important matters he would, on futureoccasions, make use of nobles less inflated by pride, and more tractablethan such grand seignors. The chancellor tried in vain to appease thechurchman's wrath, representing that the city of Antwerp would be highlyoffended at the turn things were taking, and offering his services toinduce the withdrawal, on the part of the Prince, of the language whichhad given so much offence. The Cardinal was inexorable and peremptory. "Iwill have nothing to do with the Prince, Master Chancellor, " said he, "and these are matters which concern you not. " Thus the conversationended, and thus began the open state of hostilities between the greatnobles and the Cardinal, which had been brooding so long. 

On the 23rd July, 1561, a few weeks after the scenes lately described, the Count of Egmont and the Prince of Orange addressed a joint letter tothe King. They reminded him in this despatch that, they had originallybeen reluctant to take office in the state council, on account of theirprevious experience of the manner in which business had been conductedduring the administration of the Duke of Savoy. They had feared thatimportant matters of state might be transacted without their concurrence. The King had, however, assured them, when in Zeland, that all affairswould be uniformly treated in full council. If the contrary should everprove the case, he had desired them to give him information to thateffect, that he might instantly apply the remedy. They accordingly nowgave him that information. They were consulted upon small matters:momentous affairs were decided upon in their absence. Still they wouldnot even now have complained had not Cardinal Granvelle declared that allthe members of the state council were to be held responsible for itsmeasures, whether they were present at its decisions or not. Not likingsuch responsibility, they requested the King either to accept theirresignation or to give orders that all affairs should be communicated tothe whole board and deliberated upon by all the councillors. 

In a private letter, written some weeks later (August 15), Egmont beggedsecretary Erasso to assure the King that their joint letter had not beendictated by passion, but by zeal for his service. It was impossible, hesaid, to imagine the insolence of the Cardinal, nor to form an idea ofthe absolute authority which he arrogated. 

In truth, Granvelle, with all his keenness, could not see that Orange, Egmont, Berghen, Montigny and the rest, were no longer pages and youngcaptains of cavalry, while he was the politician and the statesman. Bysix or seven years the senior of Egmont, and by sixteen years of Orange, he did not divest himself of the superciliousness of superior wisdom, notunjust nor so irritating when they had all been boys. In his deportmenttowards them, and in the whole tone of his private correspondence withPhilip, there was revealed, almost in spite of himself, an affectation ofauthority, against which Egmont rebelled and which the Prince was not theman to acknowledge. Philip answered the letter of the two nobles in hisusual procrastinating manner. The Count of Horn, who was about leavingSpain (whither he had accompanied the King) for the Netherlands, would beentrusted with the resolution which he should think proper to take uponthe subject suggested. In the mean time, he assured them that he did notdoubt their zeal in his service. 

As to Count Horn, Granvelle had already prejudiced the King against him. Horn and the Cardinal had never been friends. A brother of the prelatehad been an aspirant for the hand of the Admiral's sister, and had beensomewhat contemptuously rejected. Horn, a bold, vehement, and not verygood-tempered personage, had long kept no terms with Granvelle, and didnot pretend a friendship which he had never felt. Granvelle had justwritten to instruct the King that Horn was opposed bitterly to thatmeasure which was nearest the King's heart--the new bishoprics. He hadbeen using strong language, according to the Cardinal, in opposition tothe scheme, while still in Spain. He therefore advised that his Majesty, concealing, of course, the source of the information, and speaking as itwere out of the royal mind itself, should expostulate with the Admiralupon the subject. Thus prompted, Philip was in no gracious humor when hereceived Count Horn, then about to leave Madrid for the Netherlands, andto take with him the King's promised answer to the communication ofOrange and Egmont. His Majesty had rarely been known to exhibit so muchanger towards any person as he manifested upon that occasion. After a fewwords from the Admiral, in which he expressed his sympathy with the otherNetherland nobles, and his aversion to Granvelle, in general terms, andin reply to Philip's interrogatories, the King fiercely interrupted him:"What! miserable man!" he vociferated, "you all complain of thisCardinal, and always in vague language. Not one of you, in spite of allmy questions, can give me a single reason for your dissatisfaction. " Withthis the royal wrath boiled over in such unequivocal terms that theAdmiral changed color, and was so confused with indignation andastonishment, that he was scarcely able to find his way out of the room. 

This was the commencement of Granvelle's long mortal combat with Egmont, Horn, and Orange. This was the first answer which the seignors were toreceive to their remonstrances against the churchman's arrogance. Philipwas enraged that any opposition should be made to his coercive measures, particularly to the new bishoprics, the "holy work" which the Cardinalwas ready, to "consecrate his fortune and his blood" to advance. Granvelle fed his master's anger by constant communications as to theefforts made by distinguished individuals to delay the execution of thescheme. Assonville had informed him, he wrote, that much complaint hadbeen made on the subject by several gentlemen, at a supper of CountEgmont's. It was said that the King ought to have consulted them all, andthe state councillors especially. The present nominees to the newepiscopates were good enough, but it would be found, they said, that veryimproper personages would be afterwards appointed. The estates ought notto permit the execution of the scheme. In short, continued Granvelle, "there is the same kind of talk which brought about the recall of theSpanish troops. " A few months later, he wrote to inform Philip that apetition against the new bishoprics was about to be drawn up by "the twolords. ". They had two motives; according to the Cardinal, for thisstep--first, to let the King know that he could do nothing without theirpermission; secondly, because in the states' assembly they were then thecocks of the walk. They did not choose, therefore, that in the clericalbranch of the estates any body should be above the abbots, whom theycould frighten into doing whatever they chose. At the end, of the year, Granvelle again wrote to instruct his sovereign how to reply to theletter which was about to be addressed to him by the Prince of Orange andthe Marquis Berghen on the subject of the bishoprics. They would tellhim, he said, that the incorporation of the Brabant abbeys into the newbishoprics was contrary to the constitution of the "joyful entrance. "Philip was, however, to make answer that he had consulted theuniversities, and those learned in the laws, and had satisfied himselfthat it was entirely constitutional. He was therefore advised to send hiscommand that the Prince and Marquis should use all their influence topromote the success of the measure. Thus fortified, the King was enablednot only to deal with the petition of the nobles, but also with thedeputies from the estates of Brabant, who arrived about this time atMadrid. To these envoys, who asked for the appointment of royalcommissioners, with whom they might treat on the subject of thebishoprics, the abbeys, and the "joyful entrance, " the King answeredproudly, "that in matters which concerned the service of God, he was hisown commissioner. " He afterwards, accordingly, recited to them, withgreat accuracy, the lesson which he had privately received from theubiquitous Cardinal. Philip was determined that no remonstrance fromgreat nobles or from private citizens should interfere with the thoroughexecution of the grand scheme on which he was resolved, and of which thenew bishoprics formed an important part. Opposition irritated him moreand more, till his hatred of the opponents became deadly; but it, at thesame time, confirmed him in his purpose. "'Tis no time to temporize, " hewrote to Granvelle; "we must inflict chastisement with full rigor andseverity. These rascals can only be made to do right through fear, andnot always even by that means. "

At the same time, the royal finances did not admit of any very activemeasures, at the moment, to enforce obedience to a policy which wasalready so bitterly opposed. A rough estimate, made in the King's ownhandwriting, of the resources and obligations of his exchequer, a kind ofbalance sheet for the years 1560 and 1561, drawn up much in the samemanner as that in which a simple individual would make a note of hisincome and expenditure, gave but a dismal picture of his pecuniary, condition. It served to show how intelligent a financier is despotism, and how little available are the resources of a mighty empire whenregarded merely as private property, particularly when the owner chancesto have the vanity of attending to all details himself: "Twenty millionsof ducats, " began the memorandum, "will be required to disengage myrevenues. But of this, " added the King, with whimsical pathos for anaccount-book, "we will not speak at present, as the matter is so entirelyimpossible. " He then proceeded to enter the various items of expensewhich were to be met during the two years; such as so many millions dueto the Fuggers (the Rothschilds of the sixteenth century), so many tomerchants in Flanders, Seville, and other places, so much for PrinceDoria's galleys, so much for three years' pay due to his guards, so muchfor his household expenditure, so much for the tuition of Don Carlos, and Don Juan d'Austria, so much for salaries of ambassadors andcouncillors--mixing personal and state expenses, petty items and greatloans, in one singular jumble, but arriving at a total demand upon hispurse of ten million nine hundred and ninety thousand ducats. 

To meet this expenditure he painfully enumerated the funds upon which hecould reckon for the two years. His ordinary rents and taxes being alldeeply pledged, he could only calculate from that source upon two hundredthousand ducats. The Indian revenue, so called, was nearly spent; stillit might yield him four hundred and twenty thousand ducats. Thequicksilver mines would produce something, but so little as hardly torequire mentioning. As to the other mines, they were equally unworthy ofnotice, being so very uncertain, and not doing as well as they were wont. The licences accorded by the crown to carry slaves to America were putdown at fifty thousand ducats for the two years. The product of the"crozada" and "cuarta, " or money paid to him in small sums byindividuals, with the permission of his Holiness, for the liberty ofabstaining from the Church fasts, was estimated at five hundred thousandducats. These and a few more meagre items only sufficed to stretch hisincome to a total of one million three hundred and thirty thousand farthe two years, against an expenditure calculated at near eleven millions. "Thus, there are nine millions, less three thousand ducats, deficient, "he concluded ruefully (and making a mistake in his figures in his ownfavor of six hundred and sixty-three thousand besides), "which I may lookfor in the sky, or try to raise by inventions already exhausted. "

Thus, the man who owned all America and half of Europe could only raise amillion ducats a year from his estates. The possessor of all Peru andMexico could reckon on "nothing worth mentioning" from his mines, andderived a precarious income mainly from permissions granted his subjectsto carry on the slave-trade and to eat meat on Fridays. This wascertainly a gloomy condition of affairs for a monarch on the threshold ofa war which was to outlast his own life and that of his children; a warin which the mere army expenses were to be half a million florinsmonthly, in which about seventy per cent. Of the annual disbursements wasto be regularly embezzled or appropriated by the hands through which itpassed, and in which for every four men on paper, enrolled and paid for, only one, according to the average, was brought into the field. 

Granvelle, on the other hand, gave his master but little consolation fromthe aspect of financial affairs in the provinces. He assured him that"the government was often in such embarrassment as not to know where tolook for ten ducats. " He complained bitterly that the states would meddlewith the administration of money matters, and were slow in the grantingof subsidies. The Cardinal felt especially outraged by the interferenceof these bodies with the disbursement of the sums which they voted. Ithas been seen that the states had already compelled the government towithdraw the troops, much to the regret of Granvelle. They continued, however, to be intractable on the subject of supplies. "These are veryvile things, " he wrote to Philip, "this authority which they assume, thisaudacity with which they say whatever they think proper; and theseimpudent conditions which they affix to every proposition for subsidies. "The Cardinal protested that he had in vain attempted to convince them oftheir error, but that they remained perverse. 

It was probably at this time that the plan for debasing the coin, suggested to Philip some time before by a skilful chemist named Malen, and always much approved of both by himself and Ruy Gomez, recurred tohis mind. "Another and an extraordinary source of revenue, althoughperhaps not a very honorable one, " wrote Suriano, "has hitherto been keptsecret; and on account of differences of opinion between the King and hisconfessor, has been discontinued. " This source of revenue, it seemed, wasfound in "a certain powder, of which one ounce mixed with six ounces ofquicksilver would make six ounces of silver. " The composition was said tostand the test of the hammer, but not of the fire. Partly in consequenceof theological scruples and partly on account of opposition from thestates, a project formed by the King to pay his army with this kind ofsilver was reluctantly abandoned. The invention, however, was so veryagreeable to the King, and the inventor had received such liberalrewards, that it was supposed, according to the envoy, that in time ofscarcity his Majesty would make use of such coin without reluctance. 

It is necessary, before concluding this chapter, which relates the eventsof the years 1560 and 1561, to allude to an important affair whichoccupied much attention during the whole of this period. This is thecelebrated marriage of the Prince of Orange with the Princess Anna ofSaxony. By many superficial writers; a moving cause of the greatNetherland revolt was found in the connexion of the great chieftain withthis distinguished Lutheran house. One must have studied the charactersand the times to very little purpose, however, to believe it possiblethat much influence could be exerted on the mind of William of Orange bysuch natures as those of Anna of Saxony, or of her uncle the ElectorAugustus, surnamed "the Pious. "

The Prince had become a widower in 1558, at the age of twenty-five. Granvelle, who was said to have been influential in arranging his firstmarriage, now proposed to him, after the year of mourning had expired, analliance with Mademoiselle Renee, daughter of the Duchess de Lorraine, and granddaughter of Christiern the Third of Denmark, and his wifeIsabella, sister of the Emperor Charles the Fifth. Such a connexion, notonly with the royal house of Spain but with that of France--for, theyoung Duke of Lorraine, brother of the lady, had espoused the daughter ofHenry the considered highly desirable by the Prince. Philip and theDuchess Margaret of Parma both approved, or pretended to approve, thematch. At the same time the Dowager Duchess of Lorraine, mother of theintended bride, was a candidate, and a very urgent one, for the Regencyof the Netherlands. Being a woman of restless ambition, and intriguingcharacter, she naturally saw in a man of William's station and talents amost desirable ally in her present and future schemes. On the other hand, Philip--who had made open protestation of his desire to connect thePrince thus closely with his own blood, and had warmly recommended thematch to the young lady's mother--soon afterwards, while walking one daywith the Prince in the park at Brussels, announced to him that theDuchess of Lorraine had declined his proposals. Such a result astonishedthe Prince, who was on the best of terms with the mother, and had beenurging her appointment to the Regency with all his-influence, havingentirely withdrawn his own claims to that office. No satisfactoryexplanation was ever given of this singular conclusion to a courtship, begun with the apparent consent of all parties. It was hinted that theyoung lady did not fancy the Prince; but, as it was not known that a wordhad ever been exchanged between them, as the Prince, in appearance andreputation, was one of the most brilliant cavaliers of the age, and asthe approval of the bride was not usually a matter of primary consequencein such marriages of state, the mystery seemed to require a furthersolution. The Prince suspected Granvelle and the King, who were believedto have held mature and secret deliberation together, of insincerity. TheBishop was said to have expressed the opinion, that although thefriendship he bore the Prince would induce him to urge the marriage, yethis duty to his master made him think it questionable whether it wereright to advance a personage already placed so high by birth, wealth, andpopularity, still higher by so near an alliance with his Majesty'sfamily. The King, in consequence, secretly instructed the Duchess ofLorraine to decline the proposal, while at the same time he continuedopenly to advocate the connexion. The Prince is said to have discoveredthis double dealing, and to have found in it the only reasonableexplanation of the whole transaction. Moreover, the Duchess of Lorraine, finding herself equally duped, and her own ambitious scheme equallyfoiled by her unscrupulous cousin--who now, to the surprise of every one, appointed Margaret of Parma to be Regent, with the Bishop for her primeminister--had as little reason to be satisfied with the combinations ofroyal and ecclesiastical intrigue as the Prince of Orange himself. Soonafter this unsatisfactory mystification, William turned his attentions toGermany. Anna of Saxony, daughter of the celebrated Elector Maurice, lived at the court of her uncle, the Elector Augustus. A musket-ball, perhaps a traitorous one, in an obscure action with Albert ofBrandenbourg, had closed the adventurous career of her father seven yearsbefore. The young lady, who was thought to have inherited much of hisrestless, stormy character, was sixteen years of age. She was far fromhandsome, was somewhat deformed, and limped. Her marriage-portion wasdeemed, for the times, an ample one; she had seventy thousand rix dollarsin hand, and the reversion of thirty thousand on the death of JohnFrederic the Second, who had married her mother after the death ofMaurice. Her rank was accounted far higher in Germany than that ofWilliam of Nassau, and in this respect, rather than for pecuniaryconsiderations, the marriage seemed a desirable one for him. The man whoheld the great Nassau-Chalons property, together with the heritage ofCount Maximilian de Buren, could hardly have been tempted by 100, 000thalers. His own provision for the children who might spring from theproposed marriage was to be a settlement of seventy thousand florinsannually. The fortune which permitted of such liberality was not one tobe very materially increased by a dowry which might seem enormous to manyof the pauper princes of Germany. "The bride's portion, " says acontemporary, "after all, scarcely paid for the banquets and magnificentfestivals which celebrated the marriage. When the wedding was paid for, there was not a thaler remaining of the whole sum. " Nothing, then, couldbe more puerile than to accuse the Prince of mercenary motives in seekingthis alliance; an accusation, however, which did not fail to be brought. 

There were difficulties on both sides to be arranged before this marriagecould take place. The bride was a Lutheran, the Prince was a Catholic. With regard to the religion of Orange not the slightest doubt existed, nor was any deception attempted. Granvelle himself gave the most entireattestation of the Prince's orthodoxy. "This proposed marriage gives megreat pain, " he wrote to Philip, "but I have never had reason to suspecthis principles. " In another letter he observed that he wished themarriage could be broken off; but that he hoped so much from the virtueof the Prince that nothing could suffice to separate him from the truereligion. On the other side there was as little doubt as to his creed. Old Landgrave Philip of Hesse, grandfather of the young lady, wasbitterly opposed to the match. "'Tis a papist, " said he, "who goes tomass, and eats no meat on fast days. " He had no great objection to hischaracter, but insurmountable ones to his religion. "Old Count William, "said he, "was an evangelical lord to his dying day. This man is apapist!" The marriage, then, was to be a mixed marriage. It is necessary, however, to beware of anachronisms upon the subject. Lutherans were notyet formally denounced as heretics. On the contrary, it was exactly atthis epoch that the Pope was inviting the Protestant princes of Germanyto the Trent Council, where the schism was to be closed, and all theerring lambs to be received again into the bosom of the fold. So far frommanifesting an outward hostility, the papal demeanor was conciliating. The letters of invitation from the Pope to the princes were sent by alegate, each commencing with the exordium, "To my beloved son, " and wereall sent back to his Holiness, contemptuously, with the coarse jest foranswer, "We believe our mothers to have been honest women, and hope thatwe had better fathers. " The great council had not yet given itsdecisions. Marriages were of continual occurrence, especially amongprinces and potentates, between the adherents of Rome and of the newreligion. Even Philip had been most anxious to marry the ProtestantElizabeth, whom, had she been a peasant, he would unquestionably haveburned, if in his power. Throughout Germany, also, especially in highplaces, there was a disposition to cover up the religious controversy; toabstain from disturbing the ashes where devastation still glowed, and wasone day to rekindle itself. It was exceedingly difficult for any man, from the Archduke Maximilian down, to define his creed. A marriage, therefore; between a man and woman of discordant views upon this topicwas not startling, although in general not considered desirable. 

There were, however, especial reasons why this alliance should bedistasteful, both to Philip of Spain upon one side, and to the LandgravePhilip of Hesse on the other. The bride was the daughter of the electorMaurice. In that one name were concentrated nearly all the disasters, disgrace, and disappointment of the Emperor's reign. It was Maurice whohad hunted the Emperor through the Tyrolean mountains; it was Maurice whohad compelled the peace of Passau; it was Maurice who had overthrown theCatholic Church in Germany, it was Maurice who had frustrated Philip'selection as king of the Romans. If William of Orange must seek a wifeamong the pagans, could no other bride be found for him than the daughterof such a man?

Anna's grandfather, on the other hand, Landgrave Philip, was thecelebrated victim to the force and fraud of Charles the Fifth. He saw inthe proposed bridegroom, a youth who had been from childhood, the pettedpage and confidant of the hated Emperor, to whom he owed his longimprisonment. He saw in him too, the intimate friend and ally--for thebrooding quarrels of the state council were not yet patent to theworld--of the still more deeply detested Granvelle; the crafty priestwhose substitution of "einig" for "ewig" had inveigled him into thatterrible captivity. These considerations alone would have made himunfriendly to the Prince, even had he not been a Catholic. 

The Elector Augustus, however, uncle and guardian to the bride, was notonly well-disposed but eager for the marriage, and determined to overcomeall obstacles, including the opposition of the Landgrave, without whoseconsent he was long pledged not to bestow the hand of Anna. For thisthere were more than one reason. Augustus, who, in the words of one ofthe most acute historical critics of our day, was "a Byzantine Emperor ofthe lowest class, re-appearing in electoral hat and mantle, " was not firmin his rights to the dignity he held. He had inherited from his brother, but his brother had dispossessed John Frederic. Maurice, when turningagainst the Emperor, who had placed him in his cousin's seat, had notthought it expedient to restore to the rightful owner the rank which hehimself owed to the violence of Charles. Those claims might berevindicated, and Augustus be degraded in his turn, by a possiblemarriage of the Princess Anna, with some turbulent or intriguing Germanpotentate. Out of the land she was less likely to give trouble. Thealliance, if not particularly desirable on the score of rank, was, inother worldly respects, a most brilliant one for his niece. As for thereligious point, if he could overcome or circumvent the scruples of theLandgrave, he foresaw little difficulty in conquering his own conscience. 

The Prince of Orange, it is evident, was placed in such a position, thatit would be difficult for him to satisfy all parties. He intended thatthe marriage, like all marriages among persons in high places at thatday, should be upon the "uti possidetis" principle, which was thefoundation of the religious peace of Germany. His wife, after marriageand removal to the Netherlands, would "live Catholically;" she would beconsidered as belonging to the same Church with her husband, was to giveno offence to the government, and bring no suspicion upon himself, byviolating any of the religious decencies. Further than this, William, whoat that day was an easy, indifferent Catholic, averse to papalpersecutions, but almost equally averse to long, puritanical prayers andfaces, taking far more pleasure in worldly matters than in ecclesiasticalcontroversies, was not disposed to advance in this thorny path. Having astern bigot to deal with, in Madrid, and another in Cassel, he soonconvinced himself that he was not likely entirely to satisfy either, andthought it wiser simply to satisfy himself. 

Early in 1560, Count Gunther de Schwartzburg, betrothed to the Prince'ssister Catharine, together with Colonel George Von Holl, were despatchedto Germany to open the marriage negotiations. They found the ElectorAugustus already ripe and anxious for the connexion. It was easy for theenvoys to satisfy all his requirements on the religious question. If, asthe Elector afterwards stated to the Landgrave, they really promised thatthe young lady should be allowed to have an evangelical preacher in herown apartments, together with the befitting sacraments, it is verycertain that they travelled a good way out of their instructions, forsuch concessions were steadily refused by William in person. It is, however, more probable that Augustus, whose slippery feet were disposedto slide smoothly and swiftly over this dangerous ground, had representedthe Prince's communications under a favorable gloss of his own. At anyrate, nothing in the subsequent proceedings justified the conclusionsthus hastily formed. 

The Landgrave Philip, from the beginning, manifested his repugnance tothe match. As soon as the proposition had been received by Augustus, thatpotentate despatched Hans von Carlowitz to the grandfather at Cassel. ThePrince of Orange, it was represented, was young, handsome, wealthy, afavorite of the Spanish monarch; the Princess Anna, on the other hand, said her uncle was not likely to grow straighter or better proportionedin body, nor was her crooked and perverse character likely to improvewith years. It was therefore desirable to find a settlement for her assoon as possible. The Elector, however, would decide upon nothing withoutthe Landgrave's consent. 

To this frank, and not very flattering statement, so far as the younglady was concerned, the Landgrave answered stoutly and characteristically. The Prince was a Spanish subject, he said, and would not be able toprotect Anna in her belief, who would sooner or later become a fugitive:he was but a Count in Germany, and no fitting match for an Elector'sdaughter; moreover, the lady herself ought to be consulted, who had noteven seen the Prince. If she were crooked in body, as the Elector stated, it was a shame to expose her; to conceal it, however, was questionable, asthe Prince might complain afterwards that a straight princess had beenpromised, and a crooked one fraudulently substituted, --and so on, though agood deal more of such quaint casuistry, in which the Landgrave wasaccomplished. The amount of his answer, however, to the marriage proposalwas an unequivocal negative, from which he never wavered. 

In consequence of this opposition, the negotiations were for a timesuspended. Augustus implored the Prince not to abandon the project, promising that every effort should be made to gain over the Landgrave, hinting that the old man might "go to his long rest soon, " and evensuggesting that if the worst came to the worst, he had bound himself todo nothing without the knowledge of the Landgrave, but was not obliged towait for his consent. 

On the other hand, the Prince had communicated to the King of Spain thefact of the proposed marriage. He had also held many long conversationswith the Regent and with Granvelle. In all these interviews he haduniformly used one language: his future wife was to "live as a Catholic, "and if that point were not conceded, he would break off the negotiations. He did not pretend that she was to abjure her Protestant faith. TheDuchess, in describing to Philip the conditions, as sketched to her bythe Prince, stated expressly that Augustus of Saxony was to consent thathis niece "should live Catholically after the marriage, " but that it wasquite improbable that "before the nuptials she would be permitted toabjure her errors, and receive necessary absolution, according to therules of the Church. " The Duchess, while stating her full confidence inthe orthodoxy of the Prince, expressed at the same time her fears thatattempts might be made in the future by his new connexions "to perverthim to their depraved opinions. "

A silence of many months ensued on the part of the sovereign, duringwhich he was going through the laborious process of making up his mind, or rather of having it made up for him by people a thousand miles off. Inthe autumn Granvelle wrote to say that the Prince was very much surprisedto have been kept so long waiting for a definite reply to hiscommunications, made at the beginning of the year concerning his intendedmarriage, and to learn at last that his Majesty had sent no answer, uponthe ground that the match had been broken off; the fact being, that thenegotiations were proceeding more earnestly than ever. 

Nothing could be more helpless and more characteristic than the letterwhich Philip sent, thus pushed for a decision. "You wrote me, " said he, "that you had hopes that this matter of the Prince's marriage would go nofurther, and seeing that you did not write oftener on the subject, Ithought certainly that it had been terminated. This pleased me not alittle, because it was the best thing that could be done. Likewise, "continued the most tautological of monarchs, "I was much pleased that itshould be done. Nevertheless;" he added, "if the marriage is to beproceeded with, I really don't know what to say about it, except to referit to my sister, inasmuch as a person being upon the spot can see betterwhat can be done with regard to it; whether it be possible to prevent it, or whether it be best, if there be no remedy, to give permission. But ifthere be a remedy, it would be better to take it, because, " concluded theKing, pathetically, "I don't see how the Prince could think of marryingwith the daughter of the man who did to his majesty, now in glory, thatwhich Duke Maurice did. "

Armed with this luminous epistle, which, if it meant any thing, meant areluctant affirmation to the demand of the Prince for the royal consent, the Regent and Granvelle proceeded to summon William of Orange, and tocatechise him in a manner most galling to the pride, and with a latitudenot at all justified by any reasonable interpretation of the royalinstructions. They even informed him that his Majesty had assembled"certain persons learned in cases of conscience, and versed in theology, "according to whose advice a final decision, not yet possible, would begiven at some future period. This assembly of learned conscience-keepersand theologians had no existence save in the imaginations of Granvelleand Margaret. The King's letter, blind and blundering as it was, gave theDuchess the right to decide in the affirmative on her own responsibility;yet fictions like these formed a part of the "dissimulation, " which wasaccounted profound statesmanship by the disciples of Machiavelli. ThePrince, however irritated, maintained his steadiness; assured the Regentthat the negotiation had advanced too far to be abandoned, and repeatedhis assurance that the future Princess of Orange was to "live as aCatholic. "

In December, 1560, William made a visit to Dresden, where he was receivedby the Elector with great cordiality. This visit was conclusive as to themarriage. The appearance and accomplishments of the distinguished suitormade a profound impression upon the lady. Her heart was carried by storm. Finding, or fancying herself very desperately enamored of the proposedbridegroom, she soon manifested as much eagerness for the marriage as didher uncle, and expressed herself frequently with the violence whichbelonged to her character. "What God had decreed, " she said, "the Devilshould not hinder. "

The Prince was said to have exhibited much diligence in his attention tothe services of the Protestant Church during his visit at Dreaden. Asthat visit lasted, however, but ten or eleven days, there was no greatopportunity for shewing much zeal. 

At the same period one William Knuttel was despatched by Orange on theforlorn hope of gaining the old Landgrave's consent, without making anyvital concessions. "Will the Prince, " asked the Landgrave, "permit mygranddaughter to have an evangelical preacher in the house?"--"No, "answered Knuttel. "May she at least receive the sacrament of the Lord'sSupper in her own chamber, according to the Lutheran form?"--"No, "answered Knuttel, "neither in Breda, nor any where else in theNetherlands. If she imperatively requires such sacraments, she must goover the border for them, to the nearest Protestant sovereign. "

Upon the 14th April, 1561, the Elector, returning to the charge, caused alittle note to be drawn up on the religious point, which he forwarded, inthe hope that the Prince would copy and sign it. He added a promise thatthe memorandum should never be made public to the signer's disadvantage. 

At the same time he observed to Count Louis, verbally, "that he had beensatisfied with the declarations made by the Prince when in Dresden, uponall points, except that concerning religion. He therefore felt obliged tobeg for a little agreement in writing. "--"By no means! by no means!"interrupted Louis promptly, at the very first word, "the Prince can giveyour electoral highness no such assurance. 'T would be risking life, honor, and fortune to do so, as your grace is well aware. " The Electorprotested that the declaration, if signed, should never come into theSpanish monarch's hands, and insisted upon sending it to the Prince. Louis, in a letter to his brother, characterized the document as"singular, prolix and artful, " and strongly advised the Prince to havenothing to do with it. 

This note, which the Prince was thus requested to sign, and which hisbrother Louis thus strenuously advised him not to sign, the Prince neverdid sign. Its tenor was to the following effect:--The Princess, aftermarriage, was, neither by menace nor persuasion; to be turned from thetrue and pure Word of God, or the use of the sacrament according to thedoctrines of the Augsburg Confession. The Prince was to allow her to readbooks written in accordance with the Augsburg Confession. The prince wasto permit her, as often, annually, as she required it, to go out of theNetherlands to some place where she could receive the sacrament accordingto the Augsburg Confession. In case she were in sickness or perils ofchildbirth, the Prince, if necessary, would call to her an evangelicalpreacher, who might administer to her the holy sacrament in her chamber. The children who might spring from the marriage were to be instructed asto the doctrines of the Augsburg Confession. 

Even if executed, this celebrated memorandum would hardly have been atvariance with the declarations made by the Prince to the Spanishgovernment. He had never pretended that his bride was to become aCatholic, but only to live as a Catholic. All that he had promised, orwas expected to promise, was that his wife should conform to the law inthe Netherlands. The paper, in a general way, recognized that law. Incase of absolute necessity, however, it was stipulated that the Princessshould have the advantage of private sacraments. This certainly wouldhave been a mortal offence in a Calvinist or Anabaptist, but forLutherans the practise had never been so strict. Moreover, the Princealready repudiated the doctrines of the edicts, and rebelled against thecommand to administer them within his government. A general promise, therefore, made by him privately, in the sense of the memorandum drawn upby the Elector, would have been neither hypocritical nor deceitful, butworthy the man who looked over such grovelling heads as Granvelle andPhilip on the one side, or Augustus of Saxony on the other, and estimatedtheir religious pretences at exactly what they were worth. A formaldocument, however, technically according all these demands made by theElector, would certainly be regarded by the Spanish government as a veryculpable instrument. The Prince never signed the note, but, as we shallhave occasion to state in its proper place, he gave a verbal declaration, favorable to its tenor, but in very vague and brief terms, before anotary, on the day of the marriage. 

If the reader be of opinion that too much time has been expended upon theelucidation of this point, he should remember that the character of agreat and good man is too precious a possession of history to be lightlyabandoned. It is of no great consequence to ascertain the precise creedof Augustus of Saxony, or of his niece; it is of comparatively littlemoment to fix the point at which William of Orange ceased to be anhonest, but liberal Catholic, and opened his heart to the light of theReformation; but it is of very grave interest that his name should becleared of the charge of deliberate fraud and hypocrisy. It has thereforebeen thought necessary to prove conclusively that the Prince never gave, in Dresden or Cassel, any assurance inconsistent with his assertions toKing and Cardinal. The whole tone of his language and demeanor on thereligious subject was exhibited in his reply to the Electress, who, immediately after the marriage, entreated that he would not pervert herniece from the paths of the true religion. "She shall not be troubled, "said the Prince, "with such melancholy things. Instead of holy writ sheshall read 'Amadis de Gaule, ' and such books of pastime which discoursede amore; and instead of knitting and sewing she shall learn to dance agaldiarde, and such courtoisies as are the mode of our country andsuitable to her rank. "

The reply was careless, flippant, almost contemptuous. It is very certainthat William of Orange was not yet the "father William" he was destinedto become--grave, self-sacrificing, deeply religious, heroic; but it wasequally evident from this language that he had small sympathy, either inpublic or private, with Lutheranism or theological controversy. LandgraveWilliam was not far from right when he added, in his quaint style, afterrecalling this well-known reply, "Your grace will observe, therefore, that when the abbot has dice in his pocket, the convent will play. "

So great was the excitement at the little court of Cassel, that manyProtestant princes and nobles declared that "they would sooner give theirdaughters to a boor or a swineherd than to a Papist. " The Landgrave wasequally vigorous in his protest, drawn up in due form on the 26th April, 1561. He was not used, he said, "to flatter or to tickle with a foxtail. "He was sorry if his language gave offense, nevertheless "the marriage wasodious, and that was enough. " He had no especial objection to the Prince, "who before the world was a brave and honorable man. " He conceded thathis estates were large, although he hinted that his debts also wereample; allowed that he lived in magnificent style, had even heard "of oneof his banquets, where all the table-cloths, plates, and every thingelse, were made of sugar, " but thought he might be even a little tooextravagant; concluding, after a good deal of skimble-skamble of thisnature, with "protesting before God, the world, and all pious Christians, that he was not responsible for the marriage, but only the ElectorAugustus and others, who therefore would one day have to render accountthereof to the Lord. "

Meantime the wedding had been fixed to take place on Sunday, the 24thAugust, 1561. This was St. Bartholomew's, a nuptial day which was notdestined to be a happy one in the sixteenth century. The Landgrave andhis family declined to be present at the wedding, but a large andbrilliant company were invited. The King of Spain sent a bill of exchangeto the Regent, that she might purchase a ring worth three thousandcrowns, as a present on his part to the bride. Beside this liberalevidence that his opposition to the marriage was withdrawn, he authorizedhis sister to appoint envoys from among the most distinguished nobles torepresent him on the occasion. The Baron de Montigny, accordingly, with abrilliant company of gentlemen, was deputed by the Duchess, although shedeclined sending all the governors of the provinces, according to therequest of the Prince. The marriage was to take place at Leipsic. Aslight picture of the wedding festivities, derived entirely fromunpublished sources, may give some insight into the manners and customsof high life in Germany and the Netherlands at this epoch. 

The Kings of Spain and Denmark were invited, and were represented byspecial ambassadors. The Dukes of Brunswick, Lauenburg, Mecklenburg, theElector and Margraves of Brandenburg, the Archbishop of Cologne, the Dukeof Cleves, the Bishops of Naumburg, Meneburg, Meissen, with many otherpotentates, accepted the invitations, and came generally in person, a fewonly being represented by envoys. The town councils of Erfurt, Leipsic, Magdeburg, and other cities, were also bidden. The bridegroom waspersonally accompanied by his brothers John, Adolphus, and Louis; by theBurens, the Leuchtenbergs, and various other distinguished personages. 

As the electoral residence at Leipsic was not completely finished, separate dwellings were arranged for each of the sovereign familiesinvited, in private houses, mostly on the market-place. Here they were tobe furnished with provisions by the Elector's officials, but they were tocook for themselves. For this purpose all the princes had been requestedto bring their own cooks and butlers, together with their plate andkitchen utensils. The sovereigns themselves were to dine daily with theElector at the town-house, but the attendants and suite were to taketheir meals in their own lodgings. A brilliant collection of gentlemenand pages, appointed by the Elector to wait at his table, were ordered toassemble at Leipsic on the 22d, the guests having been all invited forthe 23d. Many regulations were given to these noble youths, that theymight discharge their duties with befitting decorum. Among other orders, they received particular injunctions that they were to abstain from alldrinking among themselves, and from all riotous conduct whatever, whilethe sovereigns and potentates should be at dinner. "It would be ashameful indecency, " it was urged, "if the great people sitting at tableshould be unable to hear themselves talk on account of the screaming ofthe attendants. " This provision did not seem unreasonable. They were alsoinstructed that if invited to drink by any personage at the great tablesthey were respectfully to decline the challenge, and to explain the causeafter the repast. 

Particular arrangements were also made for the safety of the city. Besides the regular guard of Leipsic, two hundred and twentyarquebuseers, spearsmen, and halberdmen, were ordered from theneighboring towns. These were to be all dressed in uniform; one arm, sideand leg in black, and the other in yellow, according to a paintingdistributed beforehand to the various authorities. As a mounted patrole, Leipsic had a regular force of two men. These were now increased to ten, and received orders to ride with their lanterns up and down all thestreets and lanes, to accost all persons whom they might find abroadwithout lights in their hands, to ask them their business in courteouslanguage, and at the same time to see generally to the peace and safetyof the town. 

Fifty arquebuseers were appointed to protect the town-house, and aburgher watch of six hundred was distributed in different quarters, especially to guard against fire. 

On Saturday, the day before the wedding, the guests had all arrived atLeipsic, and the Prince of Orange, with his friends, at Meneburg. OnSunday, the 24th August, the Elector at the head of his guests andattendants, in splendid array, rode forth to receive the bridegroom. Hiscavalcade numbered four thousand. William of Orange had arrived, accompanied by one thousand mounted men. The whole troop now entered thecity together, escorting the Prince to the town-house. Here hedismounted, and was received on the staircase by the Princess Anna, attended by her ladies. She immediately afterwards withdrew to herapartments. 

It was at this point, between 4 and 5 P. M. , that the Elector andElectress, with the bride and bridegroom, accompanied also by the DameSophia von Miltitz and the Councillors Hans von Ponika and UbrichWoltersdorff upon one side, and by Count John of Nassau and Heinrich vonWiltberg upon the other, as witnesses, appeared before Wolf Seidel, notary, in a corner room of the upper story of the town-house. One of thecouncillors, on the part of the Elector, then addressed the bridegroom. He observed that his highness would remember, no doubt, the contents of amemorandum or billet, sent by the Elector on the 14th April of that year, by the terms of which the Prince was to agree that he would, neither bythreat nor persuasion, prevent his future wife from continuing in theAugsburg Confession; that he would allow her to go to places where shemight receive the Augsburg sacraments; that in case of extreme need sheshould receive them in her chamber; and that the children who mightspring from the marriage should be instructed as to the Augsburgdoctrines. As, however, continued the councillor, his highness the Princeof Orange has, for various reasons, declined giving any such agreement inwriting, as therefore it had been arranged that before the marriageceremony the Prince should, in the presence of the bride and of the otherwitnesses, make a verbal promise on the subject, and as the parties werenow to be immediately united in marriage, therefore the Elector had nodoubt that the Prince would make no objection in presence of thosewitnesses to give his consent to maintain the agreements comprised in thememorandum or note. The note was then read. Thereupon, the Princeanswered verbally. "Gracious Elector; I remember the writing which yousent me on the 14th April. All the point: just narrated by the Doctorwere contained in it. I now state to your highness that I will keep itall as becomes a prince, and conform to it. " Thereupon he gave theElector his hand. --

What now was the amount and meaning of this promise on the part of thePrince? Almost nothing. He would conform to the demands of the Elector, exactly as he had hitherto said he would conform to them. Taken inconnexion with his steady objections to sign and seal any instrument onthe subject--with his distinct refusal to the Landgrave (through Knuttel)to allow the Princess an evangelical preacher or to receive thesacraments in the Netherlands--with the vehement, formal, and publicprotest, on the part of the Landgrave, against the marriage--with thePrince's declarations to the Elector at Dresden, which were satisfactoryon all points save the religious point, --what meaning could this verbalpromise have, save that the Prince would do exactly as much with regardto the religious question as he had always promised, and no more? Thiswas precisely what did happen. There was no pretence on the part of theElector, afterwards, that any other arrangement had been contemplated. The Princess lived catholically from the moment of her marriage, exactlyas Orange had stated to the Duchess Margaret, and as the Elector knewwould be the case. The first and the following children born of themarriage were baptized by Catholic priests, with very elaborate Catholicceremonies, and this with the full consent of the Elector, who sentdeputies and officiated as sponsor on one remarkable occasion. 

Who, of all those guileless lambs then, Philip of Spain, the Elector ofSaxony, or Cardinal Granvelle, had been deceived by the language oractions of the Prince? Not one. It may be boldly asserted that thePrince, placed in a transition epoch, both of the age and of his owncharacter, surrounded by the most artful and intriguing personages knownto history, and involved in a network of most intricate and difficultcircumstances, acquitted himself in a manner as honorable as it wasprudent. It is difficult to regard the notarial instrument otherwise thanas a memorandum, filed rather by Augustus than by wise William, in orderto put upon record for his own justification, his repeated thoughunsuccessful efforts to procure from the Prince a regularly signed, sealed, and holographic act, upon the points stated in the famous note. 

After the delay occasioned by these private formalities, the bridalprocession, headed by the court musicians, followed by the courtmarshals, councillors, great officers of state, and the electoral family, entered the grand hall of the town-house. The nuptial ceremony was thenperformed by "the Superintendent Doctor Pfeffinger. " Immediatelyafterwards, and in the same hall, the bride and bridegroom were placedpublicly upon a splendid, gilded bed, with gold-embroidered curtains, thePrincess being conducted thither by the Elector and Electress. Confectsand spiced drinks were then served to them and to the assembled company. After this ceremony they were conducted to their separate chambers, todress for dinner. Before they left the hall, however, Margrave Hans ofBrandenburg, on part of the Elector of Saxony, solemnly recommended thebride to her husband, exhorting him to cherish her with faith andaffection, and "to leave her undisturbed in the recognized truth of theholy gospel and the right use of the sacraments. "

Five round tables were laid in the same hall immediately afterwards--eachaccommodating ten guests. As soon as the first course of twenty-fivedishes had been put upon the chief table, the bride and bridegroom, theElector and Electress, the Spanish and Danish envoys and others, wereescorted to it, and the banquet began. During the repast, the Elector'schoir and all the other bands discoursed the "merriest and most ingeniousmusic. " The noble vassals handed the water, the napkins, and the wine, and every thing was conducted decorously and appropriately. As soon asthe dinner was brought to a close, the tables were cleared away, and theball began in the same apartment. Dances, previously arranged, wereperformed, after which "confects and drinks" were again distributed, andthe bridal pair were then conducted to the nuptial chamber. 

The wedding, according to the Lutheran custom of the epoch, had thustaken place not in a church, but in a private dwelling; the hall of thetown-house, representing, on this occasion, the Elector's own saloons. Onthe following morning, however, a procession was formed at seven o'clockto conduct the newly-married couple to the church of St. Nicholas, thereto receive an additional exhortation and benediction. Two separatecompanies of gentlemen, attended by a great number of "fifers, drummers, and trumpeters, " escorted the bride and the bridegroom, "twelve countswearing each a scarf of the Princess Anna's colors, with golden garlandson their heads and lighted torches in their hands, " preceding her to thechoir, where seats had been provided for the more illustrious portion ofthe company. The church had been magnificently decked in tapestry, and, as the company entered, a full orchestra performed several fine motettos. After listening to a long address from Dr. Pfeffinger, and receiving ablessing before the altar, the Prince and Princess of Orange returned, with their attendant processions, to the town-house. 

After dinner, upon the same and the three following days, a tournamentwas held. The lists were on the market-place, on the side nearest thetown-house; the Electress and the other ladies looking down from balconyand window to "rain influence and adjudge the prize. " The chief hero ofthese jousts, according to the accounts in the Archives, was the Electorof Saxony. He "comported himself with such especial chivalry" that hisfar-famed namesake and remote successor, Augustus the Strong, couldhardly have evinced more knightly prowess. On the first day heencountered George Von Wiedebach, and unhorsed him so handsomely that thediscomfited cavalier's shoulder was dislocated. On the following day hetilted with Michael von Denstedt, and was again victorious, hitting hisadversary full in the target, and "bearing him off over his horse's tailso neatly, that the knight came down, heels over head, upon the earth. "

On Wednesday, there was what was called the palliatourney. The Prince ofOrange, at the head of six bands, amounting in all to twenty-nine men;the Margrave George of Brandenburg, with seven bands, comprisingthirty-four men, and the Elector Augustus, with one band of four men, besides himself, all entered the lists. Lots were drawn for the "gate ofhonor, " and gained by the Margrave, who accordingly defended it with hisband. Twenty courses were then run between these champions and the Princeof Orange, with his men. The Brandenburgs broke seven lances, thePrince's party only six, so that Orange was obliged to leave the listsdiscomfited. The ever-victorious Augustus then took the field, and rantwenty courses against the defenders, breaking fourteen spears to theBrandenburg's ten. The Margrave, thus defeated, surrendered the "gate ofhonor" to the Elector, who maintained, it the rest of the day against allcomers. It is fair to suppose, although the fact is not recorded, thatthe Elector's original band had received some reinforcement. Otherwise, it would be difficult to account for these constant victories, except byascribing more than mortal strength, as well as valor, to Augustus andhis four champions. His party broke one hundred and fifty-six lances, ofwhich number the Elector himself broke thirty-eight and a half. Hereceived the first prize, but declined other guerdons adjudged to him. The reward for the hardest hitting was conferred on Wolf Von Schonberg, "who thrust Kurt Von Arnim clean out of the saddle, so that he fellagainst the barriers. "

On Thursday was the riding at the ring. The knights who partook of thissport wore various strange garbs over their armor. Some were disguised ashussars, some as miners, come as lansquenettes; others as Tartans, pilgrims, fools, bird-catchers, hunters, monks; peasants, or Netherlandcuirassiers. Each party was attended by a party of musicians, attired insimilar costume. Moreover, Count Gunter Von Schwartzburg made, hisappearance in the lists, accompanied "by five remarkable giants ofwonderful proportions and appearance, very ludicrous to behold, whoperformed all kind of odd antics on horseback. "

The next day there was a foot tourney, followed in the evening by"mummeries, " or masquerades. These masques were repeated on the followingevening, and afforded great entertainment. The costumes were magnificent, "with golden and pearl embroidery, " the dances were very merry andartistic, and the musicians, who formed a part of the company, exhibitedremarkable talent. These "mummeries" had been brought by William ofOrange from the Netherlands, at the express request of the Elector, onthe ground that such matters were much better understood in the provincesthan in Germany. 

Such is a slight sketch of the revels by which this ill-fated Bartholomewmarriage was celebrated. While William of Orange was thus employed inGermany, Granvelle seized the opportunity to make his entry into the cityof Mechlin, as archbishop; believing that such a step would be betteraccomplished in the absence of the Prince from the country. The Cardinalfound no one in the city to welcome him. None of the great nobles werethere. "The people looked upon the procession with silent hatred. No mancried, God bless him. " He wrote to the King that he should push forwardthe whole matter of the bishoprics as fast as possible, adding theridiculous assertion that the opposition came entirely from the nobility, and that "if the seigniors did not talk so much, not a man of the peoplewould open his mouth on the subject. "

The remonstrance offered by the three estates of Brabant against thescheme had not influenced Philip. He had replied in a peremptory tone. Hehad assured them that he had no intention of receding, and that theprovince of Brabant ought to feel itself indebted to him for having giventhem prelates instead of abbots to take care of their eternal interests, and for having erected their religious houses into episcopates. Theabbeys made what resistance they could, but were soon fain to come to acompromise with the bishops, who, according to the arrangement thus made, were to receive a certain portion of the abbey revenues, while theremainder was to belong to the institutions, together with a continuanceof their right to elect their own chiefs, subordinate, however, to theapprobation of the respective prelates of the diocese. Thus was theepiscopal matter settled in Brabant. In many of the other bishoprics thenew dignitaries were treated with disrespect, as they made their entranceinto their cities, while they experienced endless opposition andannoyance on attempting to take possession of the revenue assigned tothem. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 History shows how feeble are barriers of paper Licences accorded by the crown to carry slaves to America We believe our mothers to have been honest women When the abbot has dice in his pocket, the convent will play Wiser simply to satisfy himself

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 7. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER III. 1561-1562

 The inquisition the great cause of the revolt--The three varieties of the institution--The Spanish inquisition described--The Episcopal inquisition in the Netherlands--The Papal inquisition established in the provinces by Charles V. --His instructions to the inquisitors-- They are renewed by Philip--Inquisitor Titelmann--Instances of his manner of proceeding--Spanish and Netherland inquisitions compared-- Conduct of Granvelle--Faveau and Mallart condemned at Valenciennes-- "Journee des maubrulea"--Severe measures at Valenciennes--Attack of the Rhetoric Clubs Upon Granvelle--Granvelle's insinuations against Egmont and Simon Renard--Timidity of Viglius--Universal hatred toward the Cardinal--Buffoonery of Brederode and Lumey--Courage of Granvelle--Philip taxes the Netherlands for the suppression of the Huguenots in France--Meeting of the Knights of the Fleece--Assembly at the house of Orange--Demand upon the estates for supplies-- Montigny appointed envoy to Spain--Open and determined opposition to Granvelle--Secret representations by the Cardinal to Philip, concerning Egmont and other Seigniors--Line of conduct traced out for the King--Montigny's representations in Spain--Unsatisfactory result of his mission. 

The great cause of the revolt which, within a few years, was to breakforth throughout the Netherlands; was the inquisition. It is almostpuerile to look further or deeper, when such a source of convulsion liesat the very outset of any investigation. During the war there had been, for reasons already indicated, an occasional pause in the religiouspersecution. Philip had now returned to Spain, having arranged, withgreat precision, a comprehensive scheme for exterminating that religiousbelief which was already accepted by a very large portion of hisNetherland Subjects. From afar there rose upon the provinces theprophetic vision of a coming evil still more terrible than any which hadyet oppressed them. As across the bright plains of Sicily, when the sunis rising, the vast pyramidal shadow of Mount Etna is definitely andvisibly projected--the phantom of that ever-present enemy, which holdsfire and devastation in its bosom--so, in the morning hour of Philip'sreign, the shadow of the inquisition was cast from afar across those warmand smiling provinces--a spectre menacing fiercer flames and widerdesolation than those which mere physical agencies could ever compass. 

There has been a good deal of somewhat superfluous discussion concerningthe different kinds of inquisition. The distinction drawn between thepapal, the episcopal, and the Spanish inquisitions, did not, in thesixteenth century, convince many unsophisticated minds of the merits ofthe establishment in any of its shapes. However classified or entitled, it was a machine for inquiring into a man's thoughts, and for burning himif the result was not satisfactory. 

The Spanish inquisition, strictly so called, that is to say, the modernor later institution established by Pope Alexander the Sixth andFerdinand the Catholic, was doubtless invested with a more completeapparatus for inflicting human misery, and for appalling humanimagination, than any of the other less artfully arranged inquisitions, whether papal or episcopal. It had been originally devised for Jews orMoors, whom the Christianity of the age did not regard as human beings, but who could not be banished without depopulating certain districts. Itwas soon, however, extended from pagans to heretics. The DominicanTorquemada was the first Moloch to be placed upon this pedestal of bloodand fire, and from that day forward the "holy office" was almostexclusively in the hands of that band of brothers. In the eighteen yearsof Torquemada's administration; ten thousand two hundred and twentyindividuals were burned alive, and ninety-seven thousand three hundredand twenty-one punished with infamy, confiscation of property, orperpetual imprisonment, so that the total number of families destroyed bythis one friar alone amounted to one hundred and fourteen thousand fourhundred and one. In course of time the jurisdiction of the office wasextended. It taught the savages of India and America to shudder at thename of Christianity. The fear of its introduction froze the earlierheretics of Italy, France, and Ger many into orthodoxy. It was a courtowning allegiance to no temporal authority, superior to all othertribunals. It was a bench of monks without appeal, having its familiarsin every house, diving into the secrets of every fireside, judging, andexecuting its horrible decrees without responsibility. It condemned notdeeds, but thoughts. It affected to descend into individual conscience, and to punish the crimes which it pretended to discover. Its process wasreduced to a horrible simplicity. It arrested on suspicion, tortured tillconfession, and then punished by fire. Two witnesses, and those toseparate facts, were sufficient to consign the victim to a loathsomedungeon. Here he was sparingly supplied with food, forbidden to speak, oreven to sing to which pastime it could hardly be thought he would feelmuch inclination--and then left to himself, till famine and misery shouldbreak his spirit. When that time was supposed to have arrived he wasexamined. Did he confess, and forswear his heresy, whether actuallyinnocent or not, he might then assume the sacred shirt, and escape withconfiscation of all his property. Did he persist in the avowal of hisinnocence, two witnesses sent him to the stake, one witness to the rack. He was informed of the testimony against him, but never confronted withthe witness. That accuser might be his son, father, or the wife of hisbosom, for all were enjoined, under the death penalty, to inform theinquisitors of every suspicious word which might fall from their nearestrelatives. The indictment being thus supported, the prisoner was tried bytorture. The rack was the court of justice; the criminal's only advocatewas his fortitude--for the nominal counsellor, who was permitted nocommunication with the prisoner, and was furnished neither with documentsnor with power to procure evidence, was a puppet, aggravating thelawlessness of the proceedings by the mockery of legal forms: The torturetook place at midnight, in a gloomy dungeon, dimly, lighted by torches. The victim--whether man, matron, or tender virgin--was stripped naked, and stretched upon the wooden bench. Water, weights, fires, pulleys, screws--all the apparatus by which the sinews could be strained withoutcracking, the bones crushed without breaking, and the body rackedexquisitely without giving up its ghost, was now put into operation. Theexecutioner, enveloped in a black robe from head to foot, with his eyesglaring at his victim through holes cut in the hood which muffled hisface, practised successively all the forms of torture which the devilishingenuity of the monks had invented. The imagination sickens whenstriving to keep pace with these dreadful realities. Those who wish toindulge their curiosity concerning the details of the system, may easilysatisfy themselves at the present day. The flood of light which has beenpoured upon the subject more than justifies the horror and the rebellionof the Netherlanders. 

The period during which torture might be inflicted from day to day wasunlimited in duration. It could only be terminated by confession; so thatthe scaffold was the sole refuge from the rack. Individuals have bornethe torture and the dungeon fifteen years, and have been burned at thestake at last. 

Execution followed confession, but the number of condemned prisoners wasallowed to accumulate, that a multitude of victims might grace each greatgala-day. The auto-da fe was a solemn festival. The monarch, the highfunctionaries of the land, the reverend clergy, the populace regarded itas an inspiring and delightful recreation. When the appointed morningarrived, the victim was taken from his dungeon. He was then attired in ayellow robe without sleeves, like a herald's coat, embroidered all overwith black figures of devils. A large conical paper mitre was placed uponhis head, upon which was represented a human being in the midst offlames, surrounded by imps. His tongue was then painfully gagged, so thathe could neither open nor shut his mouth. After he was thus accoutred, and just as he was leaving his cell, a breakfast, consisting of everydelicacy, was placed before him, and he was urged, with ironicalpoliteness, to satisfy his hunger. He was then led forth into the publicsquare. The procession was formed with great pomp. It was headed by thelittle school children, who were immediately followed by the band ofprisoners, each attired in the horrible yet ludicrous manner described. Then came the magistrates and nobility, the prelates and otherdignitaries of the Church: the holy inquisitors, with their officials andfamiliars, followed, all on horseback, with the blood-red flag of the"sacred office" waving above them, blazoned upon either side with theportraits of Alexander and of Ferdinand, the pair of brothers who hadestablished the institution. After the procession came the rabble. Whenall had reached the neighborhood of the scaffold, and had been arrangedin order, a sermon was preached to the assembled multitude. It was filledwith laudations of the inquisition, and with blasphemous revilingsagainst the condemned prisoners. Then the sentences were read to theindividual victims. Then the clergy chanted the fifty-first psalm, thewhole vast throng uniting in one tremendous miserere. If a priesthappened to be among the culprits, he was now stripped of the canonicalswhich he had hitherto worn; while his hands, lips, and shaven crown werescraped with a bit of glass, by which process the oil of his consecrationwas supposed to be removed. He was then thrown into the common herd. Those of the prisoners who were reconciled, and those whose execution wasnot yet appointed, were now separated from the others. The rest werecompelled to mount a scaffold, where the executioner stood ready toconduct them to the fire. The inquisitors then delivered them into hishands, with an ironical request that he would deal with them tenderly, and without blood-letting or injury. Those who remained steadfast to thelast were then burned at the stake; they who in the last extremityrenounced their faith were strangled before being thrown into the flames. Such was the Spanish inquisition--technically--so called: It was, according' to the biographer of Philip the Second, a "heavenly remedy, aguardian angel of Paradise, a lions' den in which Daniel and other justmen could sustain no injury, but in which perverse sinners were torn topieces. " It was a tribunal superior to all human law, without appeal, andcertainly owing no allegiance to the powers of earth or heaven. No rank, high or humble, was safe from its jurisdiction. The royal family were notsacred, nor, the pauper's hovel. Even death afforded no protection. Theholy office invaded the prince in his palace and the beggar in hisshroud. The corpses of dead heretics were mutilated and burned. Theinquisitors preyed upon carcases and rifled graves. A gorgeous festivalof the holy office had, as we have seen, welcomed Philip to his nativeland. The news of these tremendous autos-da fe, in which so manyillustrious victims had been sacrificed before their sovereign's eyes, had reached the Netherlands almost simultaneously with the bulls creatingthe new bishoprics in the provinces. It was not likely that the measurewould be rendered more palatable by this intelligence of the royalamusements. 

The Spanish inquisition had never flourished in any soil but that of thepeninsula. It is possible that the King and Granvelle were sincere intheir protestations of entertaining no intention of introducing it intothe Netherlands, although the protestations of such men are entitled tobut little weight. The truth was, that the inquisition existed already inthe provinces. It was the main object of the government to confirm andextend the institution. The episcopal inquisition, as we have alreadyseen, had been enlarged by the enormous increase in the number ofbishops, each of whom was to be head inquisitor in his diocese, with twospecial inquisitors under him. With this apparatus and with the edicts, as already described, it might seem that enough had already been done forthe suppression of heresy. But more had been done. A regular papalinquisition also existed in the Netherlands. This establishment, like theedicts, was the gift of Charles the Fifth. A word of introduction is hereagain necessary--nor let the reader deem that too much time is devoted tothis painful subject. On the contrary, no definite idea can be formed asto the character of the Netherland revolt without a thoroughunderstanding of this great cause--the religious persecution in which thecountry had lived, breathed, and had its being, for half a century, andin which, had the rebellion not broken out at last, the population musthave been either exterminated or entirely embruted. The few years whichare immediately to occupy us in the present and succeeding chapter, present the country in a daily increasing ferment from the action ofcauses which had existed long before, but which received an additionalstimulus as the policy of the new reign developed itself. 

Previously to the accession of Charles V. , it can not be said that aninquisition had ever been established in the provinces. Isolatedinstances to the contrary, adduced by the canonists who gave their adviceto Margaret of Parma, rather proved the absence than the existence of thesystem. In the reign of Philip the Good, the vicar of theinquisitor-general gave sentence against some heretics, who were burnedin Lille (1448). In 1459, Pierre Troussart, a Jacobin monk, condemnedmany Waldenses, together with some leading citizens of Artois, accused ofsorcery and heresy. He did this, however, as inquisitor for the Bishop ofArras, so that it was an act of episcopal, and not papal inquisition. Ingeneral, when inquisitors were wanted in the provinces, it was necessaryto borrow them from France or Germany. The exigencies of persecutionmaking a domestic staff desirable, Charles the Fifth, in the year 1522, applied to his ancient tutor, whom he had placed on the papal throne. 

Charles had, however, already, in the previous year appointed Francis Vander Hulst to be inquisitor-general for the Netherlands. This man, whomErasmus called a "wonderful enemy to learning, " was also provided with acoadjutor, Nicholas of Egmond by name, a Carmelite monk, who wascharacterized by the same authority as "a madman armed with a sword. " Theinquisitor-general received full powers to cite, arrest, imprison, torture heretics without observing the ordinary forms of law, and tocause his sentences to be executed without appeal. He was, however, inpronouncing definite judgments, to take the advice of Laurens, presidentof the grand council of Mechlin, a coarse, cruel and ignorant man, who"hated learning with a more than deadly hatred, " and who might certainlybe relied upon to sustain the severest judgments which the inquisitormight fulminate. Adrian; accordingly, commissioned Van der Hulst to beuniversal and general inquisitor for all the Netherlands. At the sametime it was expressly stated that his functions were not to supersedethose exercised by the bishops as inquisitors in their own sees. Thus thepapal inquisition was established in the provinces. Van der Hulst, aperson of infamous character, was not the man to render the institutionless odious than it was by its nature. Before he had fulfilled his dutiestwo years, however, he was degraded from his office by the Emperor forhaving forged a document. In 1525, Buedens, Houseau and Coppin wereconfirmed by Clement the Seventh as inquisitors in the room of Van derHulst. In 1531, Ruard Tapper and Michael Drutius were appointed by Paulthe Third, on the decease of Coppin, the other two remaining in office. The powers of the papal inquisitors had been gradually extended, and theywere, by 1545, not only entirely independent of the episcopalinquisition, but had acquired right of jurisdiction over bishops andarchbishops, whom they were empowered to arrest and imprison. They hadalso received and exercised the privilege of appointing delegates, orsub-inquisitors, on their own authority. Much of the work was, indeed, performed by these officials, the most notorious of whom were Barbier, DeMonte, Titelmann, Fabry, Campo de Zon, and Stryen. In 1545, and again in1550, a stringent set of instructions were drawn up by the Emperor forthe guidance of these papal inquisitors. A glance at their context showsthat the establishment was not intended to be an empty form. 

They were empowered to inquire, proceed against, and chastise allheretics, all persons suspected of heresy, and their protectors. Accompanied by a notary, they were to collect written informationconcerning every person in the provinces, "infected or vehementlysuspected. " They were authorized to summon all subjects of his Majesty, whatever their rank, quality, or station, and to compel them to giveevidence, or to communicate suspicions. They were to punish all whopertinaciously refused such depositions with death. The Emperor commandedhis presidents, judges, sheriffs, and all other judicial and executiveofficers to render all "assistance to the inquisitors and their familiarsin their holy and pious inquisition, whenever required so to do, " on painof being punished as encouragers of heresy, that is to say, with death. Whenever the inquisitors should be satisfied as to the heresy of anyindividual, they were to order his arrest and detention by the judge ofthe place, or by others arbitrarily to be selected by them. The judges orpersons thus chosen, were enjoined to fulfil the order, on pain of beingpunished as protectors of heresy, that is to say, with death, by sword orfire. If the prisoner were an ecclesiastic, the inquisitor was to dealsummarily with the case "without noise or form in the process--selectingan imperial councillor to render the sentence of absolution orcondemnation. " If the prisoner were a lay person, the inquisitor was toorder his punishment, according to the edicts, by the council of theprovince. In case of lay persons suspected but not convicted of heresy, the inquisitor was to proceed to their chastisement, "with the advice ofa counsellor or some other expert. " In conclusion, the Emperor orderedthe "inquisitors to make it known that they were not doing their ownwork, but that of Christ, and to persuade all persons of this fact. " Thisclause of their instructions seemed difficult of accomplishment, for noreasonable person could doubt that Christ, had he re-appeared in humanform, would have been instantly crucified again, or burned alive in anyplace within the dominions of Charles or Philip. The blasphemy with whichthe name of Jesus was used by such men to sanctify all these namelesshorrors, is certainly not the least of their crimes. 

In addition to these instructions, a special edict had been issued on the26th April, 1550, according to which all judicial officers, at therequisition of the inquisitors, were to render them all assistance in theexecution of their office, by arresting and detaining all personssuspected of heresy, according to the instructions issued to saidinquisitors; and this, notwithstanding any privileges or charters to thecontrary. In short, the inquisitors were not subject to the civilauthority, but the civil authority to them. The imperial edict empoweredthem "to chastise, degrade, denounce, and deliver over heretics to thesecular judges for punishment; to make use of gaols, and to make arrests, without ordinary warrant, but merely with notice given to a singlecounselor, who was obliged to give sentence according to their desire, without application to the ordinary judge. "

These instructions to the inquisitors had been renewed and confirmed byPhilip, in the very first month of his reign (28th Nov. 1555). As in thecase of the edicts, it had been thought desirable by Granvelle to makeuse of the supposed magic of the Emperor's name to hallow the wholemachinery of persecution. The action of the system during the greaterpart of the imperial period had been terrible. Suffered for a time tolanguish during the French war, it had lately been renewed withadditional vigor. Among all the inquisitors, the name of Peter Titelmannwas now pre-eminent. He executed his infamous functions throughoutFlanders, Douay, and Tournay, the most thriving and populous portions ofthe Netherlands, with a swiftness, precision, and even with a jocularitywhich hardly seemed human. There was a kind of grim humor about the man. The woman who, according to Lear's fool, was wont to thrust her live eelsinto the hot paste, "rapping them o' the coxcombs with a stick and cryingreproachfully, Wantons, lie down!" had the spirit of a true inquisitor. Even so dealt Titelmann with his heretics writhing on the rack or in theflames. Cotemporary chronicles give a picture of him as of some grotesqueyet terrible goblin, careering through the country by night or day, alone, on horseback, smiting the trembling peasants on the head with agreat club, spreading dismay far and wide, dragging suspected personsfrom their firesides or their beds, and thrusting them into dungeons, arresting, torturing, strangling, burning, with hardly the shadow ofwarrant, information, or process. 

The secular sheriff, familiarly called Red-Rod, from the color of hiswand of office, meeting this inquisitor Titelmann one day upon the highroad, thus wonderingly addressed him--"How can you venture to go aboutalone, or at most with an attendant or two, arresting people on everyside, while I dare not attempt to execute my office, except at the headof a strong force, armed in proof; and then only at the peril of mylife?"

"Ah! Red-Rod, " answered Peter, jocosely, "you deal with bad people. Ihave nothing to fear, for I seize only the innocent and virtuous, whomake no resistance, and let themselves be taken like lambs. "

"Mighty well, " said the other; "but if you arrest all the good people andI all the bad, 'tis difficult to say who in the world is to escapechastisement. " The reply of the inquisitor has not been recorded, butthere is no doubt that he proceeded like a strong man to run his day'scourse. 

He was the most active of all the agents in the religious persecution atthe epoch of which we are now treating, but he had been inquisitor formany years. The martyrology of the provinces reeks with his murders. Heburned men for idle words or suspected thoughts; he rarely waited, according to his frank confession, for deeds. Hearing once that a certainschoolmaster, named Geleyn de Muler, of Audenarde, "was addicted toreading the Bible, " he summoned the culprit before him and accused him ofheresy. The schoolmaster claimed, if he were guilty of any crime, to betried before the judges of his town. "You are my prisoner, " saidTitelmann, "and are to answer me and none other. " The inquisitorproceeded accordingly to catechize him, and soon satisfied himself of theschoolmaster's heresy. He commanded him to make immediate recantation. The schoolmaster refused. "Do you not love your wife and children?" askedthe demoniac Titelmann. "God knows, " answered the heretic, "that if thewhole world were of gold, and my own, I would give it all only to havethem with me, even had I to live on bread and water and in bondage. " "Youhave then, " answered the inquisitor, "only to renounce the error of youropinions. "--"Neither for wife, children, nor all the world, can Irenounce my God and religious truth, " answered the prisoner. ThereuponTitelmann sentenced him to the stake. He was strangled and then throwninto the flames. 

At about the same-time, Thomas Calberg, tapestry weaver, of Tournay, within the jurisdiction of this same inquisitor, was convicted of havingcopied some hymns from a book printed in Geneva. He was burned alive. Another man, whose name has perished, was hacked to death with sevenblows of a rusty sword, in presence of his wife, who was sohorror-stricken that she died on the spot before her husband. His crime, to be sure, was anabaptism, the most deadly offence in the calendar. Inthe same year, one Walter Kapell was burned at the stake for hereticalopinions. He was a man of some property, and beloved by the poor peopleof Dixmuyde, in Flanders, where he resided, for his many charities. Apoor idiot, who had been often fed by his bounty, called out to theinquisitor's subalterns, as they bound his patron to the stake, "ye arebloody murderers; that man has done no wrong; but has given me bread toeat. " With these words, he cast himself headlong into the flames toperish with his protector, but was with difficulty rescued by theofficers. A day or two afterwards, he made his way to the stake, wherethe half-burnt skeleton of Walter Kapell still remained, took the bodyupon his shoulders, and carried it through the streets to the house ofthe chief burgomaster, where several other magistrates happened then tobe in session. Forcing his way into their presence, he laid his burthenat their feet, crying, "There, murderers! ye have eaten his flesh, noweat his bones!" It has not been recorded whether Titelmann sent him tokeep company with his friend in the next world. The fate of so obscure avictim could hardly find room on the crowded pages of the Netherlandmartyrdom. 

This kind of work, which went on daily, did not increase the love of thepeople for the inquisition or the edicts. It terrified many, but itinspired more with that noble resistance to oppression, particularly toreligious oppression, which is the sublimest instinct of human nature. Men confronted the terrible inquisitors with a courage equal to theircruelty: At Tournay, one of the chief cities of Titelmann's district, andalmost before his eyes, one Bertrand le Blas, a velvet manufacturer, committed what was held an almost incredible crime. Having begged hiswife and children to pray for a blessing upon what he was about toundertake, he went on Christmas-day to the Cathedral of Tournay andstationed himself near the altar. Having awaited the moment in which thepriest held on high the consecrated host, Le Blas then forced his waythrough the crowd, snatched the wafer from the hands of the astonishedecclesiastic, and broke it into bits, crying aloud, as he did so, "Misguided men, do ye take this thing to be Jesus Christ, your Lord andSaviour?" With these words, he threw the fragments on the ground andtrampled them with his feet. 

 [Histoire des Martyrs, f. 356, exev. ; apud Brandt, i. 171, 172. It may be well supposed that this would be regarded as a crime of almost inconceivable magnitude. It was death even to refuse to kneel in the streets when the wafer was carried by. Thus, for example, a poor huckster, named Simon, at Bergen-op-Zoom, who neglected to prostrate himself before his booth at the passage of the host, was immediately burned. Instances of the same punishment for that offence might be multiplied. In this particular case, it is recorded that the sheriff who was present at the execution was so much affected by the courage and fervor of the simple-minded victim, that he went home, took to his bed, became delirious, crying constantly, Ah, Simon! Simon! and died miserably, "notwithstanding all that the monks could do to console him. "]

The amazement and horror were so universal at such an appalling offence, that not a finger was raised to arrest the criminal. Priests andcongregation were alike paralyzed, so that he would have found nodifficulty in making his escape. Ho did not stir, however; he had come tothe church determined to execute what he considered a sacred duty, and toabide the consequences. After a time, he was apprehended. The inquisitordemanded if he repented of what he had done. He protested, on thecontrary, that he gloried in the deed, and that he would die a hundreddeaths to rescue from such daily profanation the name of his Redeemer, Christ. He was then put thrice to the torture, that he might be forced toreveal his accomplices. It did not seem in human power for one man toaccomplish such a deed of darkness without confederates. Bertrand hadnone, however, and could denounce none. A frantic sentence was thendevised as a feeble punishment for so much wickedness. He was dragged ona hurdle, with his mouth closed with an iron gag, to the market-place. Here his right hand and foot were burned and twisted off between twored-hot irons. His tongue was then torn out by the roots, and because hestill endeavored to call upon the name of God, the iron gag was againapplied. With his arms and legs fastened together behind his back, he wasthen hooked by the middle of his body to an iron chain, and made to swingto and fro over a slow fire till he was entirely roasted. His life lastedalmost to the end of these ingenious tortures, but his fortitude lastedas long as his life. 

In the next year, Titelmann caused one Robert Ogier, of Ryssel, inFlanders, to be arrested, together with his wife and two sons. Theircrime consisted in not going to mass, and in practising private worshipat home. They confessed the offence, for they protested that they couldnot endure to see the profanation of their Saviour's name in theidolatrous sacraments. They were asked what rites they practised in theirown house. One of the sons, a mere boy, answered, "We fall on our knees, and pray to God that he may enlighten our hearts, and forgive our sins. We pray for our sovereign, that his reign may be prosperous, and his lifepeaceful. We also pray for the magistrates and others in authority, thatGod may protect and preserve them all. " The boy's simple eloquence drewtears even from the eyes of some of his judges; for the inquisitor hadplaced the case before the civil tribunal. The father and eldest sonwere, however, condemned to the flames. "Oh God!" prayed the youth at thestake, "Eternal Father, accept the sacrifice of our lives, in the name ofthy beloved Son. "--"Thou liest, scoundrel!" fiercely interrupted a monk, who was lighting the fire; "God is not your father; ye are the devil'schildren. " As the flames rose about them, the boy cried out once more, "Look, my father, all heaven is opening, and I see ten hundred thousandangels rejoicing over us. Let us be glad, for we are dying for thetruth. "--"Thou liest! thou liest!" again screamed the monk; "all hellis opening, and you see ten thousand devils thrusting you into eternalfire. " Eight days afterwards, the wife of Ogier and his other son wereburned; so that there was an end of that family. 

Such are a few isolated specimens of the manner of proceeding in a singledistrict of the Netherlands. The inquisitor Titelmann certainly deservedhis terrible reputation. Men called him Saul the persecutor, and it waswell known that he had been originally tainted with the heresy which hehad, for so many years, been furiously chastising. At the epoch which nowengages our attention, he felt stimulated by the avowed policy of thegovernment to fresh exertions, by which all his previous achievementsshould be cast into the shade. In one day he broke into a house inRyssel, seized John de Swarte, his wife and four children, together withtwo newly-married couples, and two other persons, convicted them ofreading the Bible, and of praying in their own doors, and had them allimmediately burned. 

Are these things related merely to excite superfluous horror? Are thesufferings of these obscure Christians beneath the dignity of history? Isit not better to deal with murder and oppression in the abstract, withoutentering into trivial details? The answer is, that these things are thehistory of the Netherlands at this epoch; that these hideous detailsfurnish the causes of that immense movement, out of which a greatrepublic was born and an ancient tyranny destroyed; and that CardinalGranvelle was ridiculous when he asserted that the people would not opentheir mouths if the seigniors did not make such a noise. Because thegreat lords "owed their very souls"--because convulsions might help topay their debts, and furnish forth their masquerades andbanquets--because the Prince of Orange was ambitious, and Egmont jealousof the Cardinal--therefore superficial writers found it quite naturalthat the country should be disturbed, although that "vile and mischievousanimal, the people, " might have no objection to a continuance of thesystem which had been at work so long. On the contrary, it was exactlybecause the movement was a popular and a religious movement that it willalways retain its place among the most important events of history. Dignified documents, state papers, solemn treaties, are often of no morevalue than the lambskin on which they are engrossed. Ten thousandnameless victims, in the cause of religious and civil freedom, may buildup great states and alter the aspect of whole continents. 

The nobles, no doubt, were conspicuous, and it was well for the cause ofthe right that, as in the early hours of English liberty, the crown andmitre were opposed by the baron's sword and shield. Had all the seigniorsmade common cause with Philip and Granvelle, instead of setting theirbreasts against the inquisition, the cause of truth and liberty wouldhave been still more desperate. Nevertheless they were directed andcontrolled, under Providence, by humbler, but more powerful agencies thantheir own. The nobles were but the gilded hands on the outside of thedial--the hour to strike was determined by the obscure but weightymovements within. 

Nor is it, perhaps, always better to rely upon abstract phraseology, toproduce a necessary impression. Upon some minds, declamation concerningliberty of conscience and religious tyranny makes but a vague impression, while an effect may be produced upon them, for example by a dry, concrete, cynical entry in an account book, such as the following, takenat hazard from the register of municipal expenses at Tournay, during theyears with which we are now occupied:

 "To Mr. Jacques Barra, executioner, for having tortured, twice, Jean de Lannoy, ten sous. 

 "To the same, for having executed, by fire, said Lannoy, sixty sous. For having thrown his cinders into the river, eight sous. "

This was the treatment to which thousands, and tens of thousands, hadbeen subjected in the provinces. Men, women, and children were burned, and their "cinders" thrown away, for idle words against Rome, spokenyears before, for praying alone in their closets, for not kneeling to awafer when they met it in the streets, for thoughts to which they hadnever given utterance, but which, on inquiry, they were too honest todeny. Certainly with this work going on year after year in every city inthe Netherlands, and now set into renewed and vigorous action by a manwho wore a crown only that he might the better torture hisfellow-creatures, it was time that the very stones in the streets shouldbe moved to mutiny. 

Thus it may be seen of how much value were the protestations of Philipand of Granvelle, on which much stress has latterly been laid, that itwas not their intention to introduce the Spanish inquisition. With theedicts and the Netherland inquisition, such as we have described them, the step was hardly necessary. 

In fact, the main difference between the two institutions consisted inthe greater efficiency of the Spanish in discovering such of its victimsas were disposed to deny their faith. Devised originally for moretimorous and less conscientious infidels who were often disposed to skulkin obscure places and to renounce without really abandoning their errors, it was provided with a set of venomous familiars who glided through everychamber and coiled themselves at every fireside. The secret details ofeach household in the realm being therefore known to the holy office andto the monarch, no infidel or heretic could escape discovery. Thisinvisible machinery was less requisite for the Netherlands. There wascomparatively little difficulty in ferreting out the "vermin"--to use theexpression of a Walloon historian of that age--so that it was onlynecessary to maintain in good working order the apparatus for destroyingthe noxious creatures when unearthed. The heretics of the provincesassembled at each other's houses to practise those rites described insuch simple language by Baldwin Ogier, and denounced under such horriblepenalties by the edicts. The inquisitorial system of Spain was hardlynecessary for men who had but little prudence in concealing, and noinclination to disavow their creed. "It is quite a laughable matter, "wrote Granvelle, who occasionally took a comic view of the inquisition, "that the King should send us depositions made in Spain by which we areto hunt for heretics here, as if we did not know of thousands already. Would that I had as many doubloons of annual income, " he added, "as thereare public and professed heretics in the provinces. " No doubt theinquisition was in such eyes a most desirable establishment. "To speakwithout passion, " says the Walloon, "the inquisition well administered isa laudable institution, and not less necessary than all the other officesof spirituality and temporality belonging both to the bishops and to thecommissioners of the Roman see. " The papal and episcopal establishments, in co-operation with the edicts, were enough, if thoroughly exercised andcompletely extended. The edicts alone were sufficient. "The edicts andthe inquisition are one and the same thing, " said the Prince of Orange. The circumstance, that the civil authorities were not as entirelysuperseded by the Netherland, as by the Spanish system, was rather adifference of form than of fact. We have seen that the secular officersof justice were at the command of the inquisitors. Sheriff, gaoler, judge, and hangman, were all required, under the most terrible penalties, to do their bidding. The reader knows what the edicts were. He knows alsothe instructions to the corps of papal inquisitors, delivered by Charlesand Philip: He knows that Philip, both in person and by letter, had donehis utmost to sharpen those instructions, during the latter portion ofhis sojourn in the Netherlands. Fourteen new bishops, each with twospecial inquisitors under him, had also been appointed to carry out thegreat work to which the sovereign had consecrated his existence. Themanner in which the hunters of heretics performed their office has beenexemplified by slightly sketching the career of a single one of thesub-inquisitors, Peter Titelmann. The monarch and his minister scarcelyneeded, therefore, to transplant the peninsular exotic. Why should theydo so? Philip, who did not often say a great deal in a few words, onceexpressed the whole truth of the matter in a single sentence: "Whereforeintroduce the Spanish inquisition?" said he; "the inquisition of theNetherlands is much more pitiless than that of Spain. "

Such was the system of religious persecution commenced by Charles, andperfected by Philip. The King could not claim the merit of the invention, which justly belonged to the Emperor. At the same time, hisresponsibility for the unutterable woe caused by the continuance of thescheme is not a jot diminished. There was a time when the whole systemhad fallen into comparative desuetude. It was utterly abhorrent to theinstitutions and the manners of the Netherlanders. Even a great number ofthe Catholics in the provinces were averse to it. Many of the leadinggrandees, every one of whom was Catholic were foremost in denouncing itscontinuance. In short, the inquisition had been partially endured, butnever accepted. Moreover, it had never been introduced into Luxemburg orGroningen. In Gelderland it had been prohibited by the treaty throughwhich that province had been annexed to the emperor's dominions, and ithad been uniformly and successfully resisted in Brabant. Therefore, although Philip, taking the artful advice of Granvelle, had shelteredhimself under the Emperor's name by re-enacting, word for word, hisdecrees, and re-issuing his instructions, he can not be allowed any suchprotection at the bar of history. Such a defence for crimes so enormousis worse than futile. In truth, both father and son recognizedinstinctively the intimate connexion between ideas of religious and ofcivil freedom. "The authority of God and the supremacy of his Majesty"was the formula used with perpetual iteration to sanction the constantrecourse to scaffold and funeral pile. Philip, bigoted in religion, andfanatical in his creed of the absolute power of kings, identified himselfwillingly with the Deity, that he might more easily punish crimes againsthis own sacred person. Granvelle carefully sustained him in theseconvictions, and fed his suspicions as to the motives of those whoopposed his measures. The minister constantly represented the greatseigniors as influenced by ambition and pride. They had only disapprovedof the new bishoprics, he insinuated, because they were angry that hisMajesty should dare to do anything without their concurrence, and becausetheir own influence in the states would be diminished. It was theirobject, he said, to keep the King "in tutelage"--to make him a "shadowand a cipher, " while they should themselves exercise all authority in theprovinces. It is impossible to exaggerate the effect of such suggestionsupon the dull and gloomy mind to which they were addressed. It is easy, however, to see that a minister with such views was likely to be ascongenial to his master as he was odious to the people. For already, inthe beginning of 1562, Granvelle was extremely unpopular. "The Cardinalis hated of all men, " wrote Sir Thomas Gresham. The great strugglebetween him and the leading nobles had already commenced. The peoplejustly identified him with the whole infamous machinery of persecution, which had either originated or warmly made his own. Viglius andBerlaymont were his creatures. With the other members of the statecouncil, according to their solemn statement, already recorded, he didnot deign to consult, while he affected to hold them responsible for themeasures of the administration. Even the Regent herself complained thatthe Cardinal took affairs quite out of her hands, and that he decidedupon many important matters without her cognizance. She already began tofeel herself the puppet which it had been intended she should become; shealready felt a diminution of the respectful attachment for theecclesiastic which had inspired her when she procured his red hat. 

Granvelle was, however, most resolute in carrying out the intentions ofhis master. We have seen how vigorously he had already set himself to theinauguration of the new bishoprics, despite of opposition and obloquy. Hewas now encouraging or rebuking the inquisitors in their "pious office"throughout all the provinces. Notwithstanding his exertions, however, heresy continued to spread. In the Walloon provinces the infection wasmost prevalent, while judges and executioners were appalled by themutinous demonstrations which each successive sacrifice provoked. Thevictims were cheered on their way to the scaffold. The hymns of Marotwere sung in the very faces of the inquisitors. Two ministers, Faveau andMallart, were particularly conspicuous at this moment at Valenciennes. The governor of the province, Marquis Berghen, was constantly absent, forhe hated with his whole soul the system of persecution. For thisnegligence Granvelle denounced him secretly and perpetually to Philip, "The Marquis says openly, " said the Cardinal, "that 'tis not right toshed blood for matters of faith. With such men to aid us, your Majestycan judge how much progress we can make. " It was, however, important, inGranvelle's opinion, that these two ministers at Valenciennes should beat once put to death. They were avowed heretics, and they preached totheir disciples, although they certainly were not doctors of divinity. Moreover, they were accused, most absurdly, no doubt, of pretending towork miracles. It was said that, in presence of several witnesses, theyhad undertaken to cast out devils; and they had been apprehended on anaccusation of this nature. 

 ["Histoire des choses les plus memorables qui se sent passees en la ville et Compte de Valenciennes depuis le commencement des troubles des Pays-Bas sons le regne de Phil. II. , jusqu' a l'annee 1621. "-- MS. (Collect. Gerard). --This is a contemporary manuscript belonging to the Gerard collection in the Royal Library at the Hague. Its author was a citizen of Valenciennes, and a personal witness of most of the events which he describes. He appears to have attained to a great age, as he minutely narrates, from personal observation, many scenes which occurred before 1566, and his work is continued till the year 1621. It is a mere sketch, without much literary merit, but containing many local anecdotes of interest. Its anonymous author was a very sincere Catholic. ]

Their offence really consisted in reading the Bible to a few of theirfriends. Granvelle sent Philibert de Bruxelles to Valenciennes to procuretheir immediate condemnation and execution. He rebuked the judges andinquisitors, he sent express orders to Marquis Berghen to repair at onceto the scene of his duties. The prisoners were condemned in the autumn of1561. The magistrates were, however, afraid to carry the sentence intoeffect. Granvelle did not cease to censure them for their pusillanimity, and wrote almost daily letters, accusing the magistrates of beingthemselves the cause of the tumults by which they were appalled. Thepopular commotion was, however, not lightly to be braved. Six or sevenmonths long the culprits remained in confinement, while daily and nightlythe people crowded the streets, hurling threats and defiance at theauthorities, or pressed about the prison windows, encouraging theirbeloved ministers, and promising to rescue them in case the attemptshould be made to fulfil the sentence. At last Granvelle sent down aperemptory order to execute the culprits by fire. On the 27th of April, 1562, Faveau and Mallart were accordingly taken from their jail andcarried to the market-place, where arrangements had been made for burningthem. Simon Faveau, as the executioner was binding him to the stake, uttered the invocation, "O! Eternal Father!" A woman in the crowd, at thesame instant, took off her shoe and threw it at the funeral pile. Thiswas a preconcerted signal. A movement was at once visible in the crowd. Men in great numbers dashed upon the barriers which had been erected inthe square around the place of execution. Some seized the fagots, whichhad been already lighted, and scattered them in every direction; sometore up the pavements; others broke in pieces the barriers. Theexecutioners were prevented from carrying out the sentence, but the guardwere enabled, with great celerity and determination, to bring off theculprits and to place them in their dungeon again. The authorities werein doubt and dismay. The inquisitors were for putting the ministers todeath in prison, and hurling their heads upon the street. Eveningapproached while the officials were still pondering. The people who hadbeen chanting the Psalms of David through the town, without havingdecided what should be their course of action, at last determined torescue the victims. A vast throng, after much hesitation, accordinglydirected their steps to the prison. "You should have seen this vilepopulace, " says an eye-witness, "moving, pausing, recoiling, sweepingforward, swaying to and fro like the waves of the sea when it is agitatedby contending winds. " The attack was vigorous, the defence was weak--forthe authorities had expected no such fierce demonstration, notwithstanding the menacing language which had been so often uttered. The prisoners were rescued, and succeeded in making their escape from thecity. The day in which the execution had been thus prevented was called, thenceforward, the "day of the ill-burned, " (Journee des mau-brulez). Oneof the ministers, however, Simon Faveau, not discouraged by this nearapproach to martyrdom, persisted in his heretical labors, and was a fewyears afterwards again apprehended. "He was then, " says the chronicler, cheerfully, "burned well and finally" in the same place whence he hadformerly been rescued. [Valenciennes MS. ]

This desperate resistance to tyranny was for a moment successful, because, notwithstanding the murmurs and menaces by which the storm hadbeen preceded, the authorities had not believed the people capable ofproceeding to such lengths. Had not the heretics--in the words ofInquisitor Titelmann--allowed themselves, year after year, to be takenand slaughtered like lambs? The consternation of the magistrates was soonsucceeded by anger. The government at Brussels was in a frenzy of ragewhen informed of the occurrence. A bloody vengeance was instantlyprepared, to vindicate the insult to the inquisition. On the 29th ofApril, detachments of Bossu's and of Berghen's "band of ordonnance" weresent into Valenciennes, together with a company of the Duke of Aerschot'sregiment. The prisons were instantly filled to overflowing with men andwomen arrested for actual or suspected participation in the tumult. Orders had been sent down from the capital to make a short process and asharp execution for all the criminals. On the 16th of May, the slaughtercommenced. Some were burned at the stake, some were beheaded: the numberof victims was frightful. "Nothing was left undone by the magistrates, "says an eyewitness, with great approbation, "which could serve for thecorrection and amendment of the poor people. " It was long before thejudges and hangmen rested from their labors. When at last the havoc wascomplete, it might be supposed that a sufficient vengeance had been takenfor the "day of the ill-burned, " and an adequate amount of "amendment"provided for the "poor people. "

Such scenes as these did not tend to increase the loyalty of the nation, nor the popularity of the government. On Granvelle's head was poured adaily increasing torrent of hatred. He was looked upon in the provincesas the impersonation of that religious oppression which became everymoment more intolerable. The King and the Regent escaped much of theodium which belonged to them, because the people chose to bestow alltheir maledictions upon the Cardinal. There was, however, no greatinjustice in this embodiment. Granvelle was the government. As the peopleof that day were extremely reverent to royalty, they vented all theirrage upon the minister, while maintaining still a conventional respectfor the sovereign. The prelate had already become the constant butt ofthe "Rhetoric Chambers. " These popular clubs for the manufacture ofhomespun poetry and street farces out of the raw material of publicsentiment, occupied the place which has been more effectively filled insucceeding ages, and in free countries by the daily press. Before theinvention of that most tremendous weapon, which liberty has ever wieldedagainst tyranny, these humble but influential associations shared withthe pulpit the only power which existed of moving the passions ordirecting the opinions of the people. They were eminently liberal intheir tendencies. The authors and the actors of their comedies, poems, and pasquils were mostly artisans or tradesmen, belonging to the classout of which proceeded the early victims, and the later soldiers of theReformation. Their bold farces and truculent satire had already effectedmuch in spreading among the people a detestation of Church abuses. Theywere particularly severe upon monastic licentiousness. "These corruptcomedians, called rhetoricians, " says the Walloon contemporary alreadycited, "afforded much amusement to the people. " Always some poor littlenuns or honest monks were made a part of the farce. It seemed as if thepeople could take no pleasure except in ridiculing God and the Church. The people, however, persisted in the opinion that the ideas of a monkand of God were not inseparable. Certainly the piety of the earlyreformers was sufficiently fervent, and had been proved by the steadinesswith which they confronted torture and death, but they knew no measure inthe ridicule which they heaped upon the men by whom they were dailymurdered in droves. The rhetoric comedies were not admirable in anaesthetic point of view, but they were wrathful and sincere. Thereforethey cost many thousand lives, but they sowed the seed of resistance toreligious tyranny, to spring up one day in a hundredfold harvest. It wasnatural that the authorities should have long sought to suppress theseperambulating dramas. "There was at that tyme, " wrote honest RichardClough to Sir Thomas Gresham, "syche playes (of Reteryke) played thethath cost many a 1000 man's lyves, for in these plays was the Word of Godfirst opened in thys country. Weche playes were and are forbidden mochemore strictly than any of the bookes of Martin Luther. "

These rhetoricians were now particularly inflamed against Granvelle. Theywere personally excited against him, because he had procured thesuppression of their religious dramas. "These rhetoricians who makefarces and street plays, " wrote the Cardinal to Philip, "are particularlyangry with me, because two years ago I prevented them from ridiculing theholy Scriptures. " Nevertheless, these institutions continued to pursuetheir opposition to the course of the government. Their uncouth gambols, their awkward but stunning blows rendered daily service to the cause ofreligious freedom. Upon the newly-appointed bishops they poured out anendless succession of rhymes and rebuses, epigrams, caricatures andextravaganzas. Poems were pasted upon the walls of every house, andpassed from hand to hand. Farces were enacted in every street; the odiousecclesiastics figuring as the principal buffoons. These representationsgave so much offence, that renewed edicts were issued to suppress them. The prohibition was resisted, and even ridiculed in many provinces, particularly in Holland. The tyranny which was able to drown a nation inblood and tears, was powerless to prevent them from laughing mostbitterly at their oppressors. The tanner, Cleon, was never belabored moresoundly by the wits of Athens, than the prelate by these Flemish"rhetoricians. " With infinitely less Attic salt, but with as muchheartiness as Aristophanes could have done, the popular rhymers gave theminister ample opportunity to understand the position which he occupiedin the Netherlands. One day a petitioner placed a paper in his hand andvanished. It contained some scurrilous verses upon himself, together witha caricature of his person. In this he was represented as a hen seatedupon a pile of eggs, out of which he was hatching a brood of bishops. Some of these were clipping the shell, some thrusting forth an arm, somea leg, while others were running about with mitres on their heads, allbearing whimsical resemblance to various prelates who had beennewly-appointed. Above the Cardinal's head the Devil was representedhovering, with these words issuing from his mouth: "This is my belovedSon, listen to him, my people. "

There was another lampoon of a similar nature, which was so wellexecuted, that it especially excited Granvelle's anger. It was a rhymedsatire of a general nature, like the rest, but so delicate and sostinging, that the Cardinal ascribed it to his old friend and presentenemy, Simon Renard. This man, a Burgundian by birth, and collegeassociate of Granvelle, had been befriended both by himself and hisfather. Aided by their patronage and his own abilities, he had arrived atdistinguished posts; having been Spanish envoy both in France andEngland, and one of the negotiators of the truce of Vaucelles. He hadlatterly been disappointed in his ambition to become a councillor ofstate, and had vowed vengeance upon the Cardinal, to whom he attributedhis ill success. He was certainly guilty of much ingratitude, for he hadbeen under early obligations to the man in whose side he now became aperpetual thorn. It must be confessed, on the other hand, that Granvellerepaid the enmity of his old associate with a malevolence equal to hisown, and if Renard did not lose his head as well as his politicalstation, it was not for want of sufficient insinuation on the part of theminister. Especially did Granvelle denounce him to "the master" as theperverter of Egmont, while he usually described that nobleman himself, asweak, vain, "a friend of smoke, " easily misguided, but in the mainwell-intentioned and loyal. At the same time, with all these vaguecommendations, he never omitted to supply the suspicious King with anaccount of every fact or every rumor to the Count's discredit. In thecase of this particular satire, he informed Philip that he could swear itcame from the pen of Renard, although, for the sake of deception, therhetoric comedians had been employed. He described the production asfilled with "false, abominable, and infernal things, " and as treating notonly himself, but the Pope and the whole ecclesiastical order with asmuch contumely as could be showed in Germany. He then proceeded toinsinuate, in the subtle manner which was peculiarly his own, that Egmontwas a party to the publication of the pasquil. Renard visited at thathouse, he said, and was received there on a much more intimate footingthan was becoming. Eight days before the satire was circulated, there hadbeen a conversation in Egmont's house, of a nature exactly similar to thesubstance of the pamphlet. The man, in whose hands it was first seen, continued Granvelle, was a sword cutler, a godson of the Count. Thisperson said that he had torn it from the gate of the city hall, but Godgrant, prayed the Cardinal, that it was not he who had first posted it upthere. 'Tis said that Egmont and Mansfeld, he added, have sent many timesto the cutler to procure copies of the satire, all which augments thesuspicion against them. 

With the nobles he was on no better terms than with the people. The greatseigniors, Orange, Egmont, Horn, and others, openly avowed theirhostility to him, and had already given their reasons to the King. Mansfeld and his son at that time were both with the opposition. Aerschotand Aremberg kept aloof from the league which was forming against theprelate, but had small sympathy for his person. Even Berlaymont began tolisten to overtures from the leading nobles, who, among otherinducements, promised to supply his children with bishoprics. There werenone truly faithful and submissive to the Cardinal but such men as thePrevot Morillon, who had received much advancement from him. 

This distinguished pluralist was popularly called "double A, B, C, " toindicate that he had twice as many benefices as there were letters in thealphabet. He had, however, no objection to more, and was faithful to thedispensing power. The same course was pursued by Secretary Bave, EsquireBordey, and other expectants and dependents. Viglius, always remarkablefor his pusillanimity, was at this period already anxious to retire. Theerudite and opulent Frisian preferred a less tempestuous career. He wasin favor of the edicts, but he trembled at the uproar which their literalexecution was daily exciting, for he knew the temper of his countrymen. On the other hand, he was too sagacious not to know the inevitableconsequence of opposition to the will of Philip. He was therefore mosteager to escape the dilemma. He was a scholar, and could find moreagreeable employment among his books. He had accumulated vast wealth, andwas desirous to retain it as long as possible. He had a learned head andwas anxious to keep it upon his shoulders. These simple objects could bebetter attained in a life of privacy. The post of president of the privycouncil and member of the "Consulta" was a dangerous one. He knew thatthe King was sincere in his purposes. He foresaw that the people wouldone day be terribly in earnest. Of ancient Frisian blood himself, he knewthat the spirit of the ancient Batavians and Frisians had not whollydeserted their descendants. He knew that they were not easily roused, that they were patient, but that they would strike at last and wouldendure. He urgently solicited the King to release him, and pleaded hisinfirmities of body in excuse. Philip, however, would not listen to hisretirement, and made use of the most convincing arguments to induce himto remain. Four hundred and fifty annual florins, secured by goodreclaimed swamps in Friesland, two thousand more in hand, with a promiseof still larger emoluments when the King should come to the Netherlands, were reasons which the learned doctor honestly confessed himself unableto resist. Fortified by these arguments, he remained at his post, continued the avowed friend and adherent of Granvelle, and sustained withmagnanimity the invectives of nobles and people. To do him justice, hedid what he could to conciliate antagonists and to compromise principles. If it had ever been possible to find the exact path between right andwrong, the President would have found it, and walked in it withrespectability and complacency. 

In the council, however, the Cardinal continued to carry it with a highhand; turning his back on Orange and Egmont, and retiring with theDuchess and President to consult, after every session. Proud andimportant personages, like the Prince and Count, could ill brook suchinsolence; moreover, they suspected the Cardinal of prejudicing the mindof their sovereign against them. A report was very current, and obtainedalmost universal belief, that Granvelle had expressly advised his Majestyto take off the heads of at least half a dozen of the principal nobles inthe land. This was an error; "These two seigniors, " wrote the Cardinal toPhilip, "have been informed that I have written to your Majesty, that youwill never be master of these provinces without taking off at least halfa dozen heads, and that because it would be difficult, on account of theprobable tumults which such a course would occasion, to do it here, yourMajesty means to call them to Spain and do it there. Your Majesty canjudge whether such a thing has ever entered my thoughts. I have laughedat it as a ridiculous invention. This gross forgery is one of Renard's. "The Cardinal further stated to his Majesty that he had been informed bythese same nobles that the Duke of Alva, when a hostage for the treaty ofCateau Cambresis, had negotiated an alliance between the crowns of Franceand Spain for the extirpation of heresy by the sword. He added, that heintended to deal with the nobles with all gentleness, and that he shoulddo his best to please them. The only thing which he could not yield wasthe authority of his Majesty; to sustain that, he would sacrifice hislife, if necessary. At the same time Granvelle carefully impressed uponthe King the necessity of contradicting the report alluded to, a requestwhich he took care should also be made through the Regent in person. Hehad already, both in his own person and in that of the Duchess, beggedfor a formal denial, on the King's part, that there was any intention ofintroducing the Spanish inquisition into the Netherlands, and that theCardinal had counselled, originally, the bishoprics. Thus instructed, theKing accordingly wrote to Margaret of Parma to furnish the requiredcontradictions. In so doing, he made a pithy remark. "The Cardinal hadnot counselled the cutting off the half a dozen heads, " said the monarch, "but perhaps it would not be so bad to do it!" Time was to show whetherPhilip was likely to profit by the hint conveyed in the Cardinal'sdisclaimer, and whether the factor "half dozen" were to be used or not asa simple multiplier in the terrible account preparing. 

The contradictions, however sincere, were not believed by the personsmost interested. Nearly all the nobles continued to regard the Cardinalwith suspicion and aversion. Many of the ruder and more reckless classvied with the rhetoricians and popular caricaturists in the practicaljests which they played off almost daily against the common foe. Especially Count Brederode, "a madman, if there ever were one, " as acontemporary expressed himself, was most untiring in his efforts to makeGranvelle ridiculous. He went almost nightly to masquerades, dressed as acardinal or a monk; and as he was rarely known to be sober on these orany other occasions, the wildness of his demonstrations may easily beimagined. He was seconded on all these occasions by his cousin Robert dela Marck, Seigneur de Lumey, a worthy descendant of the famous "Wild Boarof Ardennes;" a man brave to temerity, but utterly depraved, licentious, and sanguinary. These two men, both to be widely notorious, from theirprominence in many of the most striking scenes by which the great revoltwas ushered in, had vowed the most determined animosity to the Cardinal, which was manifested in the reckless, buffooning way which belonged totheir characters. Besides the ecclesiastical costumes in which theyalways attired themselves at their frequent festivities, they also worefog-tails in their hats instead of plumes. They decked their servantsalso with the same ornaments; openly stating, that by these symbols theymeant to signify that the old fox Granvelle, and his cubs, Viglius, Berlaymont, and the rest, should soon be hunted down by them, and thebrush placed in their hats as a trophy. 

Moreover, there is no doubt that frequent threats of personal violencewere made against the Cardinal. Granvelle informed the King that his lifewas continually menaced by, the nobles, but that he feared them little, "for he believed them too prudent to attempt any thing of the kind. "There is no doubt, when his position with regard to the upper and lowerclasses in the country is considered, that there was enough to alarm atimid man; but Granvelle was constitutionally brave. He was accused ofwearing a secret shirt of mail, of living in perpetual trepidation, ofhaving gone on his knees to Egmont and Orange, of having sent Richardot, Bishop of Arras, to intercede for him in the same humiliating manner withEgmont. All these stories were fables. Bold as he was arrogant, heaffected at this time to look down with a forgiving contempt on theanimosity of the nobles. He passed much of his time alone, writing hiseternal dispatches to the King. He had a country-house, called LaFontaine, surrounded by beautiful gardens, a little way outside the gatesof Brussels, where he generally resided, and whence, notwithstanding theremonstrances of his friends, he often returned to town, after sunset, alone, or with but a few attendants. He avowed that he feared no attemptsat assassination, for, if the seigniors took his life, they would destroythe best friend they ever had. This villa, where most of his plans werematured and his state papers drawn up, was called by the people, inderision of his supposed ancestry, "The Smithy. " Here, as they believed, was the anvil upon which the chains of their slavery were forging; here, mostly deserted by those who had been his earlier, associates, he assumeda philosophical demeanor which exasperated, without deceiving hisadversaries. Over the great gate of his house he had placed the marblestatue of a female. It held an empty wine-cup in one hand, and an urn offlowing water in the other. The single word "Durate" was engraved uponthe pedestal. By the motto, which was his habitual device, he wassupposed, in this application, to signify that his power would outlastthat of the nobles, and that perennial and pure as living water, it wouldflow tranquilly on, long after the wine of their life had been drunk tothe lees. The fiery extravagance of his adversaries, and the calm andlimpid moderation of his own character, thus symbolized, were supposed toconvey a moral lesson to the world. The hieroglyphics, thus interpreted, were not relished by the nobles--all avoided his society, and declinedhis invitations. He consoled himself with the company of the lessergentry, --a class which he now began to patronize, and which he urgentlyrecommended to the favor of the King, --hinting that military and civiloffices bestowed upon their inferiors would be a means of lowering thepride of the grandees. He also affected to surround himself with evenhumbler individuals. "It makes me laugh, " he wrote to Philip, "to see thegreat seigniors absenting themselves from my dinners; nevertheless, I canalways get plenty of guests at my table, gentlemen and councillors. Isometimes invite even citizens, in order to gain their good will. "

The Regent was well aware of the anger excited in the breasts of theleading nobles by the cool manner in which they had been thrust out oftheir share in the administration of affairs. She defended herself withacrimony in her letters to the King, although a defence was hardly neededin that quarter for implicit obedience to the royal commands. Sheconfessed her unwillingness to consult with her enemies. 

She avowed her determination to conceal the secrets of the governmentfrom those who were capable of abusing her confidence. She representedthat there were members of the council who would willingly take advantageof the trepidation which she really felt, and which she should exhibit ifshe expressed herself without reserve before them. For this reason sheconfined herself, as Philip had always intended, exclusively to theConsulta. It was not difficult to recognize the hand which wrote theletter thus signed by Margaret of Parma. 

Both nobles and people were at this moment irritated by anothercircumstance. The civil war having again broken out in France, Philip, according to the promise made by him to Catharine de Medici, when he tookher daughter in marriage, was called upon to assist the Catholic partywith auxiliaries. He sent three thousand infantry, accordingly, which hehad levied in Italy, as many more collected in Spain, and gave immediateorders that the Duchess of Parma should despatch at least two thousandcavalry, from the Netherlands. Great was the indignation in the councilwhen the commands were produced. Sore was the dismay of Margaret. It wasimpossible to obey the King. The idea of sending the famous mountedgendarmerie of the provinces to fight against the French Huguenots couldnot be tolerated for an instant. The "bands of ordonnance" were very fewin number, and were to guard the frontier. They were purely for domesticpurposes. It formed no part of their duty to go upon crusades in foreignlands; still less to take a share in a religious quarrel, and least ofall to assist a monarch against a nation. These views were so cogentlypresented to the Duchess in council, that she saw the impossibility ofcomplying with her brother's commands. She wrote to Philip to thateffect. Meantime, another letter arrived out of Spain, chiding her delay, and impatiently calling upon her to furnish the required cavalry at once. The Duchess was in a dilemma. She feared to provoke another storm in thecouncil, for there was already sufficient wrangling there upon domesticsubjects. She knew it was impossible to obtain the consent, even ofBerlaymont and Viglius, to such an odious measure as the one proposed. She was, however, in great trepidation at the peremptory tone of theKing's despatch. Under the advice of Granvelle, she had recourse to atrick. A private and confidential letter of Philip was read to thecouncil, but with alterations suggested and interpolated by the Cardinal. The King was represented as being furious at the delay, but as willingthat a sum of money should be furnished instead of the cavalry, asoriginally required. This compromise, after considerable opposition, wasaccepted. The Duchess wrote to Philip, explaining and apologizing for thetransaction. The King received the substitution with as good a grace ascould have been expected, and sent fifteen hundred troopers from Spain tohis Medicean mother-in-law, drawing upon the Duchess of Parma for themoney to pay their expenses. Thus was the industry of the Netherlandstaxed that the French might be persecuted by their own monarch. 

The Regent had been forbidden, by her brother, to convoke thestates-general; a body which the Prince of Orange, sustained by Berghen, Montigny, and other nobles, was desirous of having assembled. It may beeasily understood that Granvelle would take the best care that the royalprohibition should be enforced. The Duchess, however, who, as alreadyhinted, was beginning to feel somewhat uncomfortable under the Cardinal'sdominion, was desirous of consulting some larger council than that withwhich she held her daily deliberations. A meeting of the Knights of theFleece was accordingly summoned. They assembled in Brussels, in the monthof May, 1562. The learned Viglius addressed them in a long and eloquentspeech, in which he discussed the troubled and dangerous condition of theprovinces, alluded to some of its causes, and suggested various remedies. It may be easily conceived, however, that the inquisition was not statedamong the causes, nor its suppression included among the remedies. Adiscourse, in which the fundamental topic was thus conscientiouslyomitted, was not likely, with all its concinnities, to make muchimpression upon the disaffected knights, or to exert a soothing influenceupon the people. The orator was, however, delighted with his ownperformance. He informs us, moreover, that the Duchess was equallycharmed, and that she protested she had never in her whole life heard anything more "delicate, more suitable, or more eloquent. " The Prince ofOrange, however, did not sympathize with her admiration. The President'selegant periods produced but little effect upon his mind. The meetingadjourned, after a few additional words from the Duchess, in which shebegged the knights to ponder well the causes of the increasingdiscontent, and to meet her again, prepared to announce what, in theiropinion, would be the course best adapted to maintain the honor of theKing, the safety of the provinces, and the glory of God. 

Soon after the separation of the assembly, the Prince of Orange issuedinvitations to most of the knights, to meet at his house for the purposeof private deliberation. The President and Cardinal were not included inthese invitations. The meeting was, in fact, what we should call acaucus, rather than a general gathering. Nevertheless, there were many ofthe government party present--men who differed from the Prince, and wereinclined to support Granvelle. The meeting was a stormy one. Two subjectswere discussed. The first was the proposition of the Duchess, toinvestigate the general causes of the popular dissatisfaction; the secondwas an inquiry how it could be rendered practicable to discuss politicalmatters in future--a proceeding now impossible, in consequence of theperverseness and arrogance of certain functionaries, and one which, whenever attempted, always led to the same inevitable result. This directassault upon the Cardinal produced a furious debate. His enemies weredelighted with the opportunity of venting their long-suppressed spleen. They indulged in savage invectives against the man whom they so sincerelyhated. His adherents, on the other hand--Bossu, Berlaymont, Courieres--were as warm in his defence. They replied by indignant denialsof the charge against him, and by bitter insinuations against the Princeof Orange. They charged him with nourishing the desire of being appointedgovernor of Brabant, an office considered inseparable from the generalstadholderate of all the provinces. They protested for themselves thatthey were actuated by no ambitious designs--that they were satisfied withtheir own position, and not inspired by jealousy of personages morepowerful than themselves. It is obvious that such charges andrecriminations could excite no healing result, and that the lines betweenCardinalists and their opponents would be defined in consequence moresharply than ever. The adjourned meeting of the Chevaliers of the Fleecetook place a few days afterwards. The Duchess exerted herself as much aspossible to reconcile the contending factions, without being able, however, to apply the only remedy which could be effective. The man whowas already fast becoming the great statesman of the country knew thatthe evil was beyond healing, unless by a change of purpose on the part ofthe government. The Regent, on the other hand, who it must be confessednever exhibited any remarkable proof of intellectual ability during theperiod of her residence in the Netherlands, was often inspired by afeeble and indefinite hope that the matter might be arranged by acompromise between the views of conflicting parties. Unfortunately theinquisition was not a fit subject for a compromise. 

Nothing of radical importance was accomplished by the Assembly of theFleece. It was decided that an application should be made to thedifferent states for a giant of money, and that, furthermore, a specialenvoy should be despatched to Spain. It was supposed by the Duchess andher advisers that more satisfactory information concerning the provincescould be conveyed to Philip by word of mouth than by the most elaborateepistles. The meeting was dissolved after these two measures had beenagreed upon. Doctor Viglius, upon whom devolved the duty of making thereport and petition to the states, proceeded to draw up the necessaryapplication. This he did with his customary elegance, and, as usual, verymuch to his own satisfaction. On returning to his house, however, afterhaving discharged this duty, he was very much troubled at finding that alarge mulberry-tree; which stood in his garden, had been torn up by theroots in a violent hurricane. The disaster was considered ominous by thePresident, and he was accordingly less surprised than mortified when hefound, subsequently, that his demand upon the orders had remained asfruitless as his ruined tree. The tempest which had swept his garden heconsidered typical of the storm which was soon to rage through the land, and he felt increased anxiety to reach a haven while it was yetcomparatively calm. 

The estates rejected the request for supplies, on various grounds; amongothers, that the civil war was drawing to a conclusion in France, andthat less danger was to be apprehended from that source than had latelybeen the case. Thus, the "cup of bitterness, " of which Granvelle hadalready complained; was again commended to his lips, and there was morereason than ever for the government to regret that the nationalrepresentatives had contracted the habit of meddling with financialmatters. 

Florence de Montmorency, Seigneur de Montigny, was selected by the Regentfor the mission which had been decided upon for Spain. This gentleman wasbrother to Count Horn, but possessed of higher talents and a more amiablecharacter than those of the Admiral. He was a warm friend of Orange, anda bitter enemy to Granvelle. He was a sincere Catholic, but a determinedfoe to the inquisition. His brother had declined to act as envoy. Thisrefusal can excite but little surprise, when Philip's wrath at theirparting interview is recalled, and when it is also remembered that thenew mission would necessarily lay bare fresh complaints against theCardinal, still more extensive than those which had produced the formerexplosion of royal indignation. Montigny, likewise, would have preferredto remain at home, but he was overruled. It had been written in hisdestiny that he should go twice into the angry lion's den, and that heshould come forth once, alive. 

Thus it has been shown that there was an open, avowed hostility on thepart of the grand seignors and most of the lesser nobility to theCardinal and his measures. The people fully and enthusiasticallysustained the Prince of Orange in his course. There was nothing underhandin the opposition made to the government. The Netherlands did notconstitute an absolute monarchy. They did not even constitute a monarchy. There was no king in the provinces. Philip was King of Spain, Naples, Jerusalem, but he was only Duke of Brabant, Count of Flanders, Lord ofFriesland, hereditary chief, in short, under various titles, of seventeenstates, each one of which, although not republican, possessedconstitutions as sacred as, and much more ancient than, the Crown. Theresistance to the absolutism of Granvelle and Philip was, therefore, logical, legal, constitutional. It was no cabal, no secret league, as theCardinal had the effrontery to term it, but a legitimate exercise ofpowers which belonged of old to those who wielded them, and which only anunrighteous innovation could destroy. 

Granvelle's course was secret and subtle. During the whole course of theproceedings which have just been described, he was; in daily confidentialcorrespondence with the King, besides being the actual author of themultitudinous despatches which were sent with the signature of theDuchess. He openly asserted his right to monopolize all the powers of theGovernment; he did his utmost to force upon the reluctant and almostrebellious people the odious measures which the King had resolved upon, while in his secret letters he uniformly represented the nobles whoopposed him, as being influenced, not by an honest hatred of oppressionand attachment to ancient rights, but by resentment, and jealousy oftheir own importance. He assumed, in his letters to his master, that theabsolutism already existed of right and in fact, which it was theintention of Philip to establish. While he was depriving the nobles, thestates and the nation of their privileges, and even of their naturalrights (a slender heritage in those days), he assured the King that therewas an evident determination to reduce his authority to a cipher. 

The estates, he wrote, had usurped the whole administration of thefinances, and had farmed it out to Antony Van Stralen and others, whowere making enormous profits in the business. "The seignors, " he said, "declare at their dinner parties that I wish to make them subject to theabsolute despotism of your Majesty. In point of fact, however, theyreally exercise a great deal more power than the governors of particularprovinces ever did before; and it lacks but little that Madame and yourMajesty should become mere ciphers, while the grandees monopolize thewhole power. This, " he continued, "is the principal motive of theiropposition to the new bishoprics. They were angry that your Majestyshould have dared to solicit such an arrangement at Rome, without, firstobtaining their consent. They wish to reduce your Majesty's authority toso low a point that you can do nothing unless they desire it. Theirobject is the destruction of the royal authority and of theadministration of justice, in order to avoid the payment of their debts;telling their creditors constantly that they, have spent their all inyour Majesty's service, and that they have never received recompence orsalary. This they do to make your Majesty odious. "

As a matter of course, he attributed the resistance on the part of thegreat nobles, every man of whom was Catholic, to base motives. They weremere demagogues, who refused to burn their fellow-creatures, not from anynatural repugnance to the task, but in order to gain favor with thepopulace. "This talk about the inquisition, " said he, "is all a pretext. 'Tis only to throw dust in the eyes of the vulgar, and to persuade theminto tumultuous demonstrations, while the real reason is, that theychoose that your Majesty should do nothing without their permission, andthrough their hands. "

He assumed sometimes, however, a tone of indulgence toward theseignors--who formed the main topics of his letters--an affectation whichmight, perhaps, have offended them almost as much as more open andsincere denunciation. He could forgive offences against himself. It wasfor Philip to decide as to their merits or crimes so far as the Crown wasconcerned. His language often was befitting a wise man who was speakingof very little children. "Assonleville has told me, as coming fromEgmont, " he wrote, "that many of the nobles are dissatisfied with me;hearing from Spain that I am endeavoring to prejudice your Majestyagainst them. " Certainly the tone of the Cardinal's daily letters wouldhave justified such suspicion, could the nobles have seen them. Granvellebegged the King, however, to disabuse them upon this point. "Would toGod, " said he, piously, "that they all would decide to sustain theauthority of your Majesty, and to procure such measures as tend to theservice of God and the security of the states. May I cease to exist if Ido not desire to render good service to the very least of thesegentlemen. Your Majesty knows that, when they do any thing for thebenefit of your service, I am never silent. Nevertheless, thus they areconstituted. I hope, however, that this flurry will blow over, and thatwhen your Majesty comes they will all be found to deserve rewards ofmerit. "

Of Egmont, especially, he often spoke in terms of vague, but somewhatcondescending commendation. He never manifested resentment in hisletters, although, as already stated, the Count had occasionallyindulged, not only in words, but in deeds of extreme violence againsthim. But the Cardinal was too forgiving a Christian, or too keen apolitician not to pass by such offences, so long as there was a chance ofso great a noble's remaining or becoming his friend. He, accordingly, described him, in general, as a man whose principles, in the main, weregood, but who was easily led by his own vanity and the perverse counselsof others. He represented him as having been originally a warm supporterof the new bishoprics, and as having expressed satisfaction that two ofthem, those of Bruges and Ypres, should have been within his ownstadholderate. He regretted, however; to inform the King that the Countwas latterly growing lukewarm, perhaps from fear of finding himselfseparated from the other nobles. On the whole, he was tractable enough, said the Cardinal, if he were not easily persuaded by the vile; but oneday, perhaps, he might open his eyes again. Notwithstanding these vagueexpressions of approbation, which Granvelle permitted himself in hisletters to Philip, he never failed to transmit to the monarch every fact, every rumor, every inuendo which might prejudice the royal mind againstthat nobleman or against any of the noblemen, whose characters he at thesame time protested he was most unwilling to injure. 

It is true that he dealt mainly by insinuation, while he was apt toconclude his statements with disclaimers upon his own part, and withhopes of improvement in the conduct of the seignors. At this particularpoint of time he furnished Philip with a long and most circumstantialaccount of a treasonable correspondence which was thought to be going onbetween the leading nobles and the future emperor, Maximilian. Thenarrative was a good specimen of the masterly style of inuendo in whichthe Cardinal excelled, and by which he was often enabled to convince hismaster of the truth of certain statements while affecting to discreditthem. He had heard a story, he said, which he felt bound to communicateto his Majesty, although he did not himself implicitly believe it. Hefelt himself the more bound to speak upon the subject because it talliedexactly with intelligence which he had received from another source. Thestory was that one of these seigniors (the Cardinal did not know which, for he had not yet thought proper to investigate the matter) had saidthat rather than consent that the King should act in this matter of thebishoprics against the privileges of Brabant, the nobles would elect fortheir sovereign some other prince of the blood. This, said the Cardinal, was perhaps a fantasy rather than an actual determination. Count Egmont, to be sure, he said, was constantly exchanging letters with the King ofBohemia (Maximilian), and it was supposed, therefore, that he was theprince of the blood who was to be elected to govern the provinces. It wasdetermined that he should be chosen King of the Romans, by fair means orby force, that he should assemble an army to attack the Netherlands, thata corresponding movement should be made within the states, and that thepeople should be made to rise, by giving them the reins in the matter ofreligion. The Cardinal, after recounting all the particulars of thisfiction with great minuteness, added, with apparent frankness, that thecorrespondence between Egmont and Maximilian did not astonish him, because there had been much intimacy between them in the time of the lateEmperor. He did not feel convinced, therefore, from the frequency of theletters exchanged, that there was a scheme to raise an army to attack theprovinces and to have him elected by force. On the contrary, Maximiliancould never accomplish such a scheme without the assistance of hisimperial father the Emperor, whom Granvelle was convinced would ratherdie than be mixed up with such villany against Philip. Moreover, unlessthe people should become still more corrupted by the bad counselsconstantly given them, the Cardinal did not believe that any of the greatnobles had the power to dispose in this way of the provinces at theirpleasure. Therefore, he concluded that the story was to be rejected asimprobable, although it had come to him directly from the house of thesaid Count Egmont. It is remarkable that, at the commencement of hisnarrative, the Cardinal had expressed his ignorance of the name of theseignior who was hatching all this treason, while at the end of it hegave a local habitation to the plot in the palace of Egmont. It is alsoquite characteristic that he should add that, after all, he consideredthat nobleman one of the most honest of all, if appearances did notdeceive. 

It may be supposed, however, that all these details of a plot which wasquite imaginary, were likely to produce more effect upon a mind so narrowand so suspicious as that of Philip, than could the vague assertions ofthe Cardinal, that in spite of all, he would dare be sworn that hethought the Count honest, and that men should be what they seemed. 

Notwithstanding the conspiracy, which, according to Granvelle's letters, had been formed against him, notwithstanding that his life was dailythreatened, he did not advise the King at this period to avenge him byany public explosion of wrath. He remembered, he piously observed, thatvengeance belonged to God, and that He would repay. Therefore he passedover insults meekly, because that comported best with his Majesty'sservice. Therefore, too, he instructed Philip to make no demonstration atthat time, in order not to damage his own affairs. He advised him todissemble, and to pretend not to know what was going on in the provinces. Knowing that his master looked to him daily for instructions, alwaysobeyed them with entire docility, and, in fact, could not move a step inNetherland matters without them, he proceeded to dictate to him the termsin which he was to write to the nobles, and especially laid down rulesfor his guidance in his coming interviews with the Seigneur de Montigny. Philip, whose only talent consisted in the capacity to learn such lessonswith laborious effort, was at this juncture particularly in need oftuition. The Cardinal instructed him, accordingly, that he was todisabuse all men of the impression that the Spanish inquisition was to beintroduced into the provinces. He was to write to the seigniors, promising to pay them their arrears of salary; he was to exhort them todo all in their power for the advancement of religion and maintenance ofthe royal authority; and he was to suggest to them that, by his answer tothe Antwerp deputation, it was proved that there was no intention ofestablishing the inquisition of Spain, under pretext of the newbishoprics. 

The King was, furthermore, to signify his desire that all the noblesshould exert themselves to efface this false impression from the popularmind. He was also to express himself to the same effect concerning theSpanish inquisition, the bishoprics, and the religious question, in thepublic letters to Madame de Parma, which were to be read in full council. The Cardinal also renewed his instructions to the King as to the mannerin which the Antwerp deputies were to be answered, by giving them, namely, assurances that to transplant the Spanish inquisition into theprovinces would be as hopeless as to attempt its establishment in Naples. He renewed his desire that Philip should contradict the story about thehalf dozen heads, and he especially directed him to inform Montigny thatBerghen had known of the new bishoprics before the Cardinal. This, urgedGranvelle, was particularly necessary, because the seigniors wereirritated that so important a matter should have been decided uponwithout their advice, and because the Marquis Berghen was now the "cockof the opposition. "

At about the same time, it was decided by Granvelle and the Regent, inconjunction with the King, to sow distrust and jealousy among the nobles, by giving greater "mercedes" to some than to others, although large sumswere really due to all. In particular, the attempt was made in thispaltry manner, to humiliate William of Orange. A considerable sum waspaid to Egmont, and a trifling one to the Prince, in consideration oftheir large claims upon the treasury. Moreover the Duke of Aerschot wasselected as envoy to the Frankfort Diet, where the King of the Romans wasto be elected, with the express intention, as Margaret wrote to Philip, of creating divisions among the nobles, as he had suggested. The Duchessat the same time informed her brother that, according to, Berlaymont, thePrince of Orange was revolving some great design, prejudicial to hisMajesty's service. 

Philip, who already began to suspect that a man who thought so much mustbe dangerous, was eager to find out the scheme over which William theSilent was supposed to be brooding, and wrote for fresh intelligence tothe Duchess. 

Neither Margaret nor the Cardinal, however, could discover any thingagainst the Prince--who, meantime, although disappointed of the missionto Frankfort, had gone to that city in his private capacity--saving thathe had been heard to say, "one day we shall be the stronger. " Granvelleand Madame de Parma both communicated this report upon the same day, butthis was all that they were able to discover of the latent plot. 

In the autumn of this year (1562) Montigny made his visit to Spain, asconfidential envoy from the Regent. The King being fully prepared as tothe manner in which he was to deal with him, received the ambassador withgreat cordiality. He informed him in the course of their interviews, thatGranvelle had never attempted to create prejudice against the nobles, that he was incapable of the malice attributed to him, and that even wereit otherwise, his evil representations against other public servantswould produce no effect. The King furthermore protested that he had nointention of introducing the Spanish inquisition into the Netherlands, and that the new bishops were not intended as agents for such a design, but had been appointed solely with a view of smoothing religiousdifficulties in the provinces, and of leading his people back into thefold of the faithful. He added, that as long ago as his visit to Englandfor the purpose of espousing Queen Mary, he had entertained the projectof the new episcopates, as the Marquis Berghen, with whom he hadconversed freely upon the subject, could bear witness. With regard to theconnexion of Granvelle with the scheme, he assured Montigny that theCardinal had not been previously consulted, but had first learned theplan after the mission of Sonnius. 

Such was the purport of the King's communications to the envoy, asappears from memoranda in the royal handwriting and from thecorrespondence of Margaret of Parma. Philip's exactness in conforming tohis instructions is sufficiently apparent, on comparing his statementswith the letters previously received from the omnipresent Cardinal. Beyond the limits of those directions the King hardly hazarded asyllable. He was merely the plenipotentiary of the Cardinal, as Montignywas of the Regent. So long as Granvelle's power lasted, he was absoluteand infallible. Such, then, was the amount of satisfaction derived fromthe mission of Montigny. There was to be no diminution of the religiouspersecution, but the people were assured upon royal authority, that theinquisition, by which they were daily burned and beheaded, could not belogically denominated the Spanish inquisition. In addition to thecomfort, whatever it might be, which the nation could derive from thisstatement, they were also consoled with the information that Granvellewas not the inventor of the bishoprics. Although he had violentlysupported the measure as soon as published, secretly denouncing astraitors and demagogues, all those who lifted their voices against it, although he was the originator of the renewed edicts, although he took, daily, personal pains that this Netherland inquisition, "more pitilessthan the Spanish, " should be enforced in its rigor, and although he, atthe last, opposed the slightest mitigation of its horrors, he was to berepresented to the nobles and the people as a man of mild andunprejudiced character, incapable of injuring even his enemies. "I willdeal with the seigniors most blandly, " the Cardinal had written toPhilip, "and will do them pleasure, even if they do not wish it, for thesake of God and your Majesty. " It was in this light, accordingly, thatPhilip drew the picture of his favorite minister to the envoy. Montigny, although somewhat influenced by the King's hypocritical assurances ofthe benignity with which he regarded the Netherlands, was, nevertheless, not to be deceived by this flattering portraiture of a man whom he knewso well and detested so cordially as he did Granvelle. Solicited by theKing, at their parting interview, to express his candid opinion as to thecauses of the dissatisfaction in the provinces, Montigny very frankly andmost imprudently gave vent to his private animosity towards the Cardinal. He spoke of his licentiousness, greediness, ostentation, despotism, andassured the monarch that nearly all the inhabitants of the Netherlandsentertained the same opinion concerning him. He then dilated upon thegeneral horror inspired by the inquisition and the great repugnance feltto the establishment of the new episcopates. These three evils, Granvelle, the inquisition, and the bishoprics, he maintained were thereal and sufficient causes of the increasing popular discontent. Time wasto reveal whether the open-hearted envoy was to escape punishment for hisfrankness, and whether vengeance for these crimes against Granvelle andPhilip were to be left wholly, as the Cardinal had lately suggested, inthe hands of the Lord. 

Montigny returned late in December. His report concerning the results ofhis mission was made in the state council, and was received with greatindignation. The professions of benevolent intentions on the part of thesovereign made no impression on the mind of Orange, who was already inthe habit of receiving secret information from Spain with regard to theintentions of the government. He knew very well that the plot revealed tohim by Henry the Second in the wood of Vincennes was still the royalprogram, so far as the Spanish monarch was concerned. Moreover, his angerwas heightened by information received from Montigny that the names ofOrange, Egmont and their adherents, were cited to him as he passedthrough France as the avowed defenders of the Huguenots, in politics andreligion. The Prince, who was still a sincere Catholic, while he hatedthe persecutions of the inquisition, was furious at the statement. Aviolent scene occurred in the council. Orange openly denounced the reportas a new slander of Granvelle, while Margaret defended the Cardinal anddenied the accusation, but at the same time endeavored with the utmostearnestness to reconcile the conflicting parties. 

It had now become certain, however, that the government could no longerbe continued on its present footing. Either Granvelle or the seigniorsmust succumb. The Prince of Orange was resolved that the Cardinal shouldfall or that he would himself withdraw from all participation in theaffairs of government. In this decision he was sustained by Egmont, Horn, Montigny, Berghen, and the other leading nobles. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Affecting to discredit them An inspiring and delightful recreation (auto-da-fe) Arrested on suspicion, tortured till confession Inquisition of the Netherlands is much more pitiless Inquisition was not a fit subject for a compromise Made to swing to and fro over a slow fire Orator was, however, delighted with his own performance Philip, who did not often say a great deal in a few words Scaffold was the sole refuge from the rack Ten thousand two hundred and twenty individuals were burned Torquemada's administration (of the inquisition) Two witnesses sent him to the stake, one witness to the rack

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 8. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER IV. 1563-1564

 Joint letter to Philip, from Orange, Egmont, and Horn--Egmont's quarrel with Aerschot and with Aremberg--Philip's answer to the three nobles--His instructions to the Duchess--Egmont declines the King's invitation to visit Spain--Second letter of the three seigniors--Mission of Armenteros--Letter of Alva--Secret letters of Granvelle to Philip--The Cardinal's insinuations and instructions-- His complaints as to the lukewarmness of Berghen and Montigny in the cause of the inquisition--Anecdotes to their discredit privately chronicled by Granvelle--Supposed necessity for the King's presence in the provinces--Correspondence of Lazarus Schwendi--Approaching crisis--Anxiety of Granvelle to retire--Banquet of Caspar Schetz-- Invention of the foolscap livery--Correspondence of the Duchess and of the Cardinal with Philip upon the subject--Entire withdrawal of the three seigniors from the state council--the King advises with Alva concerning the recall of Granvelle--Elaborate duplicity of Philip's arrangements--His secret note to the Cardinal--His dissembling letters to others--Departure of Granvelle from the Netherlands--Various opinions as to its cause--Ludicrous conduct of Brederode and Hoogstraaten--Fabulous statements in Granvelle's correspondence concerning his recall--Universal mystification--The Cardinal deceived by the King--Granvelle in retirement--His epicureanism--Fears in the provinces as to his return--Universal joy at his departure--Representations to his discredit made by the Duchess to Philip--Her hypocritical letters to the Cardinal-- Masquerade at Count Mansfeld's--Chantonnay's advice to his brother-- Review of Granvelle's administration and estimate of his character. 

On the 11th March, 1563, Orange, Horn, and Egmont united in a remarkableletter to the King. They said that as their longer "taciturnity" mightcause the ruin of his Majesty's affairs, they were at last compelled tobreak silence. They hoped that the King would receive with benignity acommunication which was pure, frank, and free from all passion. Theleading personages of the province, they continued, having thoroughlyexamined the nature and extent of Cardinal Granvelle's authority, hadarrived at the conclusion that every thing was in his hands. Thispersuasion, they said, was rooted in the hearts of all his Majesty'ssubjects, and particularly in their own, so deeply, that it could not beeradicated as long as the Cardinal remained. The King was thereforeimplored to consider the necessity of remedying the evil. The royalaffairs, it was affirmed, would never be successfully conducted so longas they were entrusted to Granvelle, because he was so odious to so manypeople. If the danger were not imminent, they should not feel obliged towrite to his Majesty with so much vehemence. It was, however, an affairwhich allowed neither delay nor dissimulation. They therefore prayed theKing, if they had ever deserved credence in things of weight, to believethem now. By so doing, his Majesty would avoid great mischief. Many grandseigniors, governors, and others, had thought it necessary to give thisnotice, in order that the King might prevent the ruin of the country. If, however, his Majesty were willing, as they hoped, to avoid discontentingall for the sake of satisfying one, it was possible that affairs mightyet prosper. That they might not be thought influenced by ambition or byhope of private profit, the writers asked leave to retire from the statecouncil. Neither their reputation, they said, nor the interests of theroyal service would permit them to act with the Cardinal. They professedthemselves dutiful subjects and Catholic vassals. Had it not been for thezeal of the leading seigniors, the nobility, and other well-disposedpersons, affairs would not at that moment be so tranquil; the commonpeople having been so much injured, and the manner of life pursued by theCardinal not being calculated to give more satisfaction than was affordedby his unlimited authority. In conclusion, the writers begged his Majestynot to throw the blame upon them, if mischance should follow the neglectof this warning. This memorable letter was signed by Guillaume, deNassau, Lamoral d'Egmont, and Philippes de Montmorency (Count Horn). Itwas despatched undercover to Charles de Tisnacq, a Belgian, andprocurator for the affairs of the Netherlands at Madrid, a man whoserelations with Count Egmont were of a friendly character. It wasimpossible, however, to keep the matter a secret from the person mostinterested. The Cardinal wrote to the King the day before the letter waswritten, and many weeks before it was sent, to apprize him that it wascoming, and to instruct him as to the answer he was to make. Nearly allthe leading nobles and governors had adhered to the substance of theletter, save the Duke of Aerschot, Count Aremberg, and Baron Berlaymont. The Duke and Count had refused to join the league; violent scenes havingoccurred upon the subject between them and the leaders of the oppositionparty. Egmont, being with a large shooting party at Aerschot's countryplace, Beaumont, had taken occasion to urge the Duke to join in thegeneral demonstration against the Cardinal, arguing the matter in therough, off-hand, reckless manner which was habitual with him. Hisarguments offended the nobleman thus addressed, who was vain andirascible. He replied by affirming that he was a friend to Egmont, butwould not have him for his master. He would have nothing to do, he said, with their league against the Cardinal, who had never given him cause ofenmity. He had no disposition to dictate to the King as to his choice ofministers, and his Majesty was quite right to select his servants at hisown pleasure. The Duke added that if the seigniors did not wish him for afriend, it was a matter of indifference to him. Not one of them was hissuperior; he had as large a band of noble followers and friends as thebest of them, and he had no disposition to accept the supremacy of anynobleman in the land. The conversation carried on in this key soon becamea quarrel, and from words the two gentlemen would soon have come toblows, but for the interposition of Aremberg and Robles, who were presentat the scene. The Duchess of Parma, narrating the occurrence to the King, added that a duel had been the expected result of the affair, but thatthe two nobles had eventually been reconciled. It was characteristic ofAerschot that he continued afterward to associate with the nobles uponfriendly terms, while maintaining an increased intimacy with theCardinal. 

The gentlemen who sent the letter were annoyed at the premature publicitywhich it seemed to have attained. Orange had in vain solicited CountAremberg to join the league, and had quarrelled with him in consequence. Egmont, in the presence of Madame de Parma, openly charged Aremberg withhaving divulged the secret which had been confided to him. The Countfiercely denied that he had uttered a syllable on the subject to a humanbeing; but added that any communication on his part would have been quitesuperfluous, while Egmont and his friends were daily boasting of whatthey were to accomplish. Egmont reiterated the charge of a breach offaith by Aremberg. That nobleman replied by laying his hand upon hissword, denouncing as liars all persons who should dare to charge himagain with such an offence, and offering to fight out the quarrel uponthe instant. Here, again, personal combat was, with much difficulty, averted. 

Egmont, rude, reckless, and indiscreet, was already making manifest thathe was more at home on a battle-field than in a political controversywhere prudence and knowledge of human nature were as requisite ascourage. He was at this period more liberal in his sentiments than at anymoment of his life. Inflamed by his hatred of Granvelle, and determinedto compass the overthrow of that minister, he conversed freely with allkinds of people, sought popularity among the burghers, and descanted toevery one with much imprudence upon the necessity of union for the sakeof liberty and the national good. The Regent, while faithfully recordingin her despatches every thing of this nature which reached her ears, expressed her astonishment at Egmont's course, because, as she had oftentaken occasion to inform the King, she had always considered the Countmost sincerely attached to his Majesty's service. 

Berlaymont, the only other noble of prominence who did not approve the11th of March letter, was at this period attempting to "swim in twowaters, " and, as usual in such cases, found it very difficult to keephimself afloat. He had refused to join the league, but he stood alooffrom Granvelle. On a hope held out by the seigniors that his son shouldbe made Bishop of Liege, he had ceased during a whole year from visitingthe Cardinal, and had never spoken to him at the council-board. Granvelle, in narrating these circumstances to the King, expressed theopinion that Berlaymont, by thus attempting to please both parties, hadthoroughly discredited himself with both. 

The famous epistle, although a most reasonable and manly statement of anincontrovertible fact, was nevertheless a document which it required muchboldness to sign. The minister at that moment seemed omnipotent, and itwas obvious that the King was determined upon a course of political andreligious absolutism. It is, therefore, not surprising that, althoughmany sustained its principles, few were willing to affix their names to apaper which might prove a death-warrant to the signers. Even Montigny andBerghen, although they had been active in conducting the whole cabal, ifcabal it could be called, refused to subscribe the letter. Egmont andHorn were men of reckless daring, but they were not keen-sighted enoughto perceive fully the consequences of their acts. 

Orange was often accused by his enemies of timidity, but no man everdoubted his profound capacity to look quite through the deeds of men. Hispolitical foresight enabled him to measure the dangerous precipice whichthey were deliberately approaching, while the abyss might perhaps beshrouded to the vision of his companions. He was too tranquil of natureto be hurried, by passions into a grave political step, which in coolermoments he might regret. He resolutely, therefore, and with his eyesopen, placed himself in open and recorded enmity with the most powerfuland dangerous man in the whole Spanish realm, and incurred the resentmentof a King who never forgave. It may be safely averred that as muchcourage was requisite thus to confront a cold and malignant despotism, and to maintain afterwards, without flinching, during a whole lifetime, the cause of national rights and liberty of conscience, as to head themost brilliant charge of cavalry that ever made hero famous. 

Philip answered the letter of the three nobles on the 6th June following. In this reply, which was brief, he acknowledged the zeal and affection bywhich the writers had been actuated. He suggested, nevertheless, that, asthey had mentioned no particular cause for adopting the advice containedin their letter, it would be better that one of them should come toMadrid to confer with him. Such matters, he said, could be better treatedby word of mouth. He might thus receive sufficient information to enablehim to form a decision, for, said he in conclusion, it was not his customto aggrieve any of his ministers without cause. 

This was a fine phrase, but under the circumstances of its application, quite ridiculous. There was no question of aggrieving the minister. Theletter of the three nobles was very simple. It consisted of a fact and adeduction. The fact stated was, that the Cardinal was odious to allclasses of the nation. The deduction drawn was, that the government couldno longer be carried on by him without imminent danger of ruinousconvulsions. The fact was indisputable. The person most interestedconfirmed it in his private letters. "'Tis said, " wrote Granvelle toPhilip, "that grandees, nobles, and people, all abhor me, nor am Isurprised to find that grandees, nobles, and people are all openlyagainst me, since each and all have been invited to join in the league. "The Cardinal's reasons for the existence of the unpopularity, which headmitted to the full, have no bearing upon the point in the letter. Thefact was relied upon to sustain a simple, although a momentous inference. It was for Philip to decide upon the propriety of the deduction, and toabide by the consequences of his resolution when taken. As usual, however, the monarch was not capable of making up his mind. He knew verywell that the Cardinal was odious and infamous, because he was thewilling impersonation of the royal policy. Philip was, therefore, logically called upon to abandon the policy or to sustain the minister. He could make up his mind to do neither the one nor the other. In themean time a well-turned period of mock magnanimity had been furnishedhim. This he accordingly transmitted as his first answer to a mostimportant communication upon a subject which, in the words of thewriters, "admitted neither of dissimulation nor delay. " To deprive Philipof dissimulation and delay, however, was to take away his all. They werethe two weapons with which he fought his long life's battle. They summedup the whole of his intellectual resources. It was inevitable, therefore, that he should at once have recourse to both on such an emergency as thepresent one. 

At the same time that he sent his answer to the nobles, he wrote anexplanatory letter to the Regent. He informed her that he had receivedthe communication of the three seigniors, but instructed her that she wasto appear to know nothing of the matter until Egmont should speak to herupon the subject. He added that, although he had signified his wish tothe three nobles, that one of them, without specifying which, should cometo Madrid, he in reality desired that Egmont, who seemed the mosttractable of the three, should be the one deputed. The King added, thathis object was to divide the nobles, and to gain time. 

It was certainly superfluous upon Philip's part to inform his sister thathis object was to gain time. Procrastination was always his first refuge, as if the march of the world's events would pause indefinitely while hesat in his cabinet and pondered. It was, however, sufficiently puerile torecommend to his sister an affectation of ignorance on a subjectconcerning which nobles had wrangled, and almost drawn their swords inher presence. This, however, was the King's statesmanship when left tohis unaided exertions. Granvelle, who was both Philip and Margaret wheneither had to address or to respond to the world at large, did not alwaysfind it necessary to regulate the correspondence of his puppets betweenthemselves. In order more fully to divide the nobles, the King alsotransmitted to Egmont a private note, in his own handwriting, expressinghis desire that he should visit Spain in person, that they might confertogether upon the whole subject. 

These letters, as might be supposed, produced any thing but asatisfactory effect. The discontent and rage of the gentlemen who hadwritten or sustained the 11th of March communication, was much increased. The answer was, in truth, no answer at all. "'Tis a cold and bad reply, "wrote Louis of Nassau, "to send after so long a delay. 'Tis easy to seethat the letter came from the Cardinal's smithy. In summa it is a vilebusiness, if the gentlemen are all to be governed by one person. I hopeto God his power will come soon to an end. Nevertheless, " added Louis, "the gentlemen are all wide awake, for they trust the red fellow not abit more than he deserves. "

The reader has already seen that the letter was indeed "from theCardinal's smithy, " Granvelle having instructed his master how to replyto the seigniors before the communication had been despatched. 

The Duchess wrote immediately to inform her brother that Egmont hadexpressed himself willing enough to go to Spain, but had added that hemust first consult Orange and Horn. As soon as that step had been taken, she had been informed that it was necessary for them to advise with allthe gentlemen who had sanctioned their letter. The Duchess had then triedin vain to prevent such an assembly, but finding that, even if forbidden, it would still take place, she had permitted the meeting in Brussels, asshe could better penetrate into their proceedings there, than if itshould be held at a distance. She added, that she should soon send hersecretary Armenteros to Spain, that the King might be thoroughlyacquainted with what was occurring. 

Egmont soon afterwards wrote to Philip, declining to visit Spainexpressly on account of the Cardinal. He added, that he was ready toundertake the journey, should the King command his presence for any otherobject. The same decision was formally communicated to the Regent bythose Chevaliers of the Fleece who had approved the 11th of Marchletter--Montigny; Berghen, Meghem, Mansfeld, Ligne, Hoogstraaten, Orange, Egmont, and Horn. The Prince of Orange, speaking in the name of all, informed her that they did not consider it consistent with theirreputation, nor with the interest of his Majesty, that any one of themshould make so long and troublesome a journey, in order to accuse theCardinal. For any other purpose, they all held themselves ready to go toSpain at once. The Duchess expressed her regret at this resolution. ThePrince replied by affirming that, in all their proceedings, they had beengoverned, not by hatred of Granvelle but by a sense of duty to hisMajesty. It was now, he added, for the King to pursue what course itpleased him. 

Four days after this interview with the Regent, Orange, Egmont, and Hornaddressed a second letter to the King. In this communication they statedthat they had consulted with all the gentlemen with whose approbationtheir first letter had been written. As to the journey of one of them toSpain, --as suggested, they pronounced it very dangerous for any seigniorto absent himself, in the condition of affairs which then existed. It wasnot a sufficient cause to go thither on account of Granvelle. Theydisclaimed any intention of making themselves parties to a processagainst the Cardinal. They had thought that their simple, briefannouncement would have sufficed to induce his Majesty to employ thatpersonage in other places, where his talents would be more fruitful. Asto "aggrieving the Cardinal without cause, " there was no question ofaggrieving him at all, but of relieving him of an office which could notremain in his hands without disaster. As to "no particular cause havingbeen mentioned, " they said the omission was from no lack of many such. They had charged none, however, because, from their past services andtheir fidelity to his Majesty, they expected to be believed on theirhonor, without further witnesses or evidence. They had no intention ofmaking themselves accusers. They had purposely abstained fromspecifications. If his Majesty should proceed to ampler information, causes enough would be found. It was better, however, that they should befurnished by others than by themselves. His Majesty would then find thatthe public and general complaint was not without adequate motives. Theyrenewed their prayer to be excused from serving in the council of state, in order that they might not be afterwards inculpated for the faults ofothers. Feeling that the controversy between themselves and the Cardinalde Granvelle in the state council produced no fruit for his Majesty'saffairs, they preferred to yield to him. In conclusion, they begged theKing to excuse the simplicity of their letters, the rather that they werenot by nature great orators, but more accustomed to do well than to speakwell, which was also more becoming to persons of their quality. 

On the 4th of August, Count Horn also addressed a private letter to theKing, written in the same spirit as that which characterized the jointletter just cited. He assured his Majesty that the Cardinal could renderno valuable service to the crown on account of the hatred which the wholenation bore him, but that, as far as regarded the maintenance of theancient religion, all the nobles were willing to do their duty. 

The Regent now despatched, according to promise, her private secretary, Thomas de Armenteros, to Spain. His instructions, which were veryelaborate, showed that Granvelle was not mistaken when he charged herwith being entirely changed in regard to him, and when he addressed her areproachful letter, protesting his astonishment that his conduct hadbecome auspicious, and his inability to divine the cause of the wearinessand dissatisfaction which she manifested in regard to him. 

Armenteros, a man of low, mercenary, and deceitful character, but afavorite of the Regent, and already beginning to acquire that influenceover her mind which was soon to become so predominant, was no friend ofthe Cardinal. It was not probable that he would diminish the effect ofthat vague censure mingled with faint commendation, which characterizedMargaret's instructions by any laudatory suggestions of his own. He wasdirected to speak in general terms of the advance of heresy, and theincreasing penury of the exchequer. He was to request two hundredthousand crowns toward the lottery, which the Regent proposed to set upas a financial scheme. He was to represent that the Duchess had tried, unsuccessfully, every conceivable means of accommodating the quarrelbetween the Cardinal and the seigniors. She recognized Granvelle's greatcapacity, experience, zeal, and devotion--for all which qualities shemade much of him--while on the other hand she felt that it would be agreat inconvenience, and might cause a revolt of the country, were she toretain him in the Netherlands against the will of the seigniors. Thesemotives had compelled her, the messenger was to add, to place both viewsof the subject before the eyes of the King. Armenteros was, furthermore, to narrate the circumstances of the interviews which had recently takenplace between herself and the leaders of the opposition party. 

From the tenor of these instructions, it was sufficiently obvious thatMargaret of Parma was not anxious to retain the Cardinal, but that, onthe contrary, she was beginning already to feel alarm at the dangerousposition in which she found herself. A few days after the three nobleshad despatched their last letter to the King, they had handed her aformal remonstrance. In this document they stated their conviction thatthe country was on the high road to ruin, both as regarded his Majesty'sservice and the common weal. The bare, the popular discontent dailyincreasing, the fortresses on the frontier in a dilapidated condition. Itwas to be apprehended daily that merchants and other inhabitants of theprovinces would be arrested in foreign countries, to satisfy the debtsowed by his Majesty. To provide against all these evils, but one course, it was suggested, remained to the government--to summon thestates-general, and to rely upon their counsel and support. The nobles, however, forbore to press this point, by reason of the prohibition whichthe Regent had received from the King. They suggested, however, that suchan interdiction could have been dictated only by a distrust createdbetween his Majesty and the estates by persons having no love for either, and who were determined to leave no resource by which the distress of thecountry could be prevented. The nobles, therefore, begged her highnessnot to take it amiss if, so long as the King was indisposed to make otherarrangements for the administration of the provinces, they should abstainfrom appearing at the state council. They preferred to cause the shadowat last to disappear, which they had so long personated. In conclusion, however, they expressed their determination to do their duty in theirseveral governments, and to serve the Regent to the best of theirabilities. 

After this remonstrance had been delivered, the Prince of Orange, CountHorn, and Count Egmont abstained entirely from the sessions of the statecouncil. She was left alone with the Cardinal, whom she already hated, and with his two shadows, Viglius and Berlaymont. 

Armenteros, after a month spent on his journey, arrived in Spain, and wassoon admitted to an audience by Philip. In his first interview, whichlasted four hours, he read to the King all the statements and documentswith which he had come provided, and humbly requested a prompt decision. Such a result was of course out of the question. Moreover, the Cortes ofTarragon, which happened then to be in session, and which required theroyal attention, supplied the monarch with a fresh excuse for indulgingin his habitual vacillation. Meantime, by way of obtaining additionalcounsel in so grave an emergency, he transmitted the letters of thenobles, together with the other papers, to the Duke of Alva, andrequested his opinion on the subject. Alva replied with the roar of awild beast, "Every time, " he wrote, "that I see the despatches of thosethree Flemish seigniors my rage is so much excited that if I did not useall possible efforts to restrain it, my sentiments would seem those of amadman. " After this splenitive exordium he proceeded to express theopinion that all the hatred and complaints against the Cardinal hadarisen from his opposition to the convocation of the states-general. Withregard to persons who had so richly deserved such chastisement, herecommended "that their heads should be taken off; but, until this couldbe done, that the King should dissemble with them. " He advised Philip notto reply to their letters, but merely to intimate, through the Regent, that their reasons for the course proposed by them did not seemsatisfactory. He did not prescribe this treatment of the case as "a trueremedy, but only as a palliative; because for the moment only weakmedicines could be employed, from which, however, but small effect couldbe anticipated. " As to recalling the Cardinal, "as they had the impudenceto propose to his Majesty, " the Duke most decidedly advised against thestep. In the mean time, and before it should be practicable to proceed"to that vigorous chastisement already indicated, " he advised separatingthe nobles as much as possible by administering flattery and deceitfulcaresses to Egmont, who might be entrapped more easily than the others. 

Here, at least, was a man who knew his own mind. Here was a servant whocould be relied upon to do his master's bidding whenever this mastershould require his help. The vigorous explosion of wrath with which theDuke thus responded to the first symptoms of what he regarded asrebellion, gave a feeble intimation of the tone which he would assumewhen that movement should have reached a more advanced stage. It might beguessed what kind of remedies he would one day prescribe in place of the"mild medicines" in which he so reluctantly acquiesced for the present. 

While this had been the course pursued by the seigniors, the Regent andthe King, in regard to that all-absorbing subject of Netherlandpolitics--the straggle against Granvelle--the Cardinal, in his letters toPhilip, had been painting the situation by minute daily touches, in amanner of which his pencil alone possessed the secret. 

Still maintaining the attitude of an injured but forgiving Christian, hespoke of the nobles in a tone of gentle sorrow. He deprecated any risingof the royal wrath in his behalf; he would continue to serve thegentlemen, whether they would or no; he was most anxious lest anyconsiderations on his account should interfere with the King's decisionin regard to the course to be pursued in the Netherlands. At the sametime, notwithstanding these general professions of benevolence towardsthe nobles, he represented them as broken spendthrifts, wishing to creategeneral confusion in order to escape from personal liabilities; asconspirators who had placed themselves within the reach of theattorney-general; as ambitious malcontents who were disposed to overthrowthe royal authority, and to substitute an aristocratic republic upon itsruins. He would say nothing to prejudice the King's mind against thesegentlemen, but he took care to omit nothing which could possiblyaccomplish that result. He described them as systematically opposed tothe policy which he knew lay nearest the King's heart, and as determinedto assassinate the faithful minister who was so resolutely carrying itout, if his removal could be effected in no other way. He spoke of thestate of religion as becoming more and more unsatisfactory, and bewailedthe difficulty with which he could procure the burning of heretics;difficulties originating in the reluctance of men from whose elevatedrank better things might have been expected. 

As Granvelle is an important personage, as his character has beenalternately the subject of much censure and of more applause, and as theepoch now described was the one in which the causes of the greatconvulsion were rapidly germinating, it is absolutely necessary that thereader should be placed in a position to study the main character, aspainted by his own hand; the hand in which were placed, at that moment, the destinies of a mighty empire. It is the historian's duty, therefore, to hang the picture of his administration fully in the light. At themoment when the 11th of March letter was despatched, the Cardinalrepresented Orange and Egmont as endeavoring by every method of menace orblandishment to induce all the grand seigniors and petty nobles to joinin the league against himself. They had quarrelled with Aerschot andAremberg, they had more than half seduced Berlaymont, and theystigmatized all who refused to enter into their league as cardinalistsand familiars of the inquisition. He protested that he should regardtheir ill-will with indifference, were he not convinced that he washimself only a pretext, and that their designs were really much deeper. Since the return of Montigny, the seigniors had established a leaguewhich that gentleman and his brother, Count Horn, had both joined. Hewould say nothing concerning the defamatory letters and pamphlets ofwhich he was the constant object, for he wished no heed taken of matterswhich concerned exclusively himself, Notwithstanding this disclaimer, however, he rarely omitted to note the appearance of all such productionsfor his Majesty's especial information. "It was better to calm men'sspirits, " he said, "than to excite them. " As to fostering quarrels amongthe seigniors, as the King had recommended, that was hardly necessary, for discord was fast sowing its own seeds. "It gave him much pain, " hesaid, with a Christian sigh, "to observe that such dissensions hadalready arisen, and unfortunately on his account. " He then proceededcircumstantially to describe the quarrel between Aerschot and Egmont, already narrated by the Regent, omitting in his statement no particularwhich could make Egmont reprehensible in the royal eyes. He likewisepainted the quarrel between the same noble and Aremberg, to which he hadalready alluded in previous letters to the King, adding that manygentlemen, and even the more prudent part of the people, weredissatisfied with the course of the grandees, and that he was takingunderhand but dexterous means to confirm them in such sentiments. Heinstructed Philip how to reply to the letter addressed to him, but beggedhis Majesty not to hesitate to sacrifice him if the interests of hiscrown should seem to require it. 

With regard to religious matters, he repeatedly deplored that, notwithstanding his own exertions and those of Madame de Parma, thingswere not going on as he desired, but, on the contrary, very badly. "Forthe-love of God and the service of the holy religion, " he cried outfervently, "put your royal hand valiantly to the work, otherwise we haveonly to exclaim, Help, Lord, for we perish!"

Having uttered this pious exhortation in the ear of a man who needed nostimulant in the path of persecution, he proceeded to express his regretsthat the judges and other officers were not taking in hand thechastisement of heresy with becoming vigor. 

Yet, at that very moment Peter Titelmann was raging through Flanders, tearing whole families out of bed and burning them to ashes, with suchutter disregard to all laws or forms as to provoke in the very next yeara solemn protest from the four estates of Flanders; and Titelmann was butone of a dozen inquisitors. 

Granvelle, however, could find little satisfaction in the exertions ofsubordinates so long as men in high station were remiss in their duties. The Marquis Berghen, he informed Philip, showed but little disposition toput down heresy, in Valenciennes, while Montigny was equally remiss atTournay. They were often heard to say, to any who chose to listen, thatit was not right to inflict the punishment of death for matters ofreligion. This sentiment, uttered in that age of blood and fire, andcrowning the memory of those unfortunate nobles with eternal honor, wasdenounced by the churchman as criminal, and deserving of castigation. Heintimated, moreover, that these pretences of clemency were merehypocrisy, and that self-interest was at the bottom of their compassion. "'Tis very black, " said he, "when interest governs; but these men are ain debt, so deeply that they owe their very souls. They are seeking everymeans of escaping from their obligations, and are most desirous ofcreating general confusion. " As to the Prince of Orange, the Cardinalasserted that he owed nine hundred thousand florins, and had hardlytwenty-five thousand a-year clear income, while he spent ninety thousand, having counts; barons, and gentlemen in great numbers, in his household. At this point, he suggested that it might be well to find employment forsome of these grandees in Spain and other dominions of his Majesty, adding that perhaps Orange might accept the vice-royalty of Sicily. 

Resuming the religious matter, a few weeks later, he expressed himself alittle more cheerfully, "We have made so much outcry, " said he, "that atlast Marquis Berghen has been forced to burn a couple of heretics atValenciennes. Thus, it is obvious, " moralized the Cardinal, "that if hewere really willing to apply the remedy in that place, much progressmight be made; but that we can do but little so long as he remains in thegovernment of the provinces and refuses to assist us. " In a subsequentletter, he again uttered com plaints against the Marquis and Montigny, who were evermore his scapegoats and bugbears. Berghen will give us noaid, he wrote, despite of all the letters we send him. He absents himselffor private and political reasons. Montigny has eaten meat in Lent, asthe Bishop of Tournay informs me. Both he and the Marquis say openly thatit is not right to shed blood for matters of faith, so that the King canjudge how much can be effected with such coadjutors. Berghen avoids thepersecution of heretics, wrote the Cardinal again, a month later, toSecretary Perez. He has gone to Spa for his health, although those whosaw him last say he is fat and hearty. 

Granvelle added, however, that they had at last "burned one more preacheralive. " The heretic, he stated, had feigned repentance to save his life, but finding that, at any rate, his head would be cut off as a dogmatizer, he retracted his recantation. "So, " concluded the Cardinal, complacently, "they burned him. "

He chronicled the sayings and doings of the principal personages in theNetherlands, for the instruction of the King, with great regularity, insinuating suspicions when unable to furnish evidence, and addingcharitable apologies, which he knew would have but small effect upon themind of his correspondent. Thus he sent an account of a "very secretmeeting" held by Orange, Egmont, Horn, Montigny and Berghen, at the abbeyof La Forest, near Brussels, adding, that he did not know what they hadbeen doing there, and was at loss what to suspect. He would be mosthappy, he said, to put the best interpretation upon their actions, but hecould not help remembering with great sorrow the observation so recentlymade by Orange to Montigny, that one day they should be stronger. Laterin the year, the Cardinal informed the King that the same nobles wereholding a conference at Weerdt, that he had not learned what had beentransacted there, but thought the affair very suspicious. Philipimmediately communicated the intelligence to Alva, together with anexpression of Granvelle's fears and of his own, that a popular outbreakwould be the consequence of the continued presence of the minister in theNetherlands. 

The Cardinal omitted nothing in the way of anecdote or inuendo, whichcould injure the character of the leading nobles, with the exception, perhaps, of Count Egmont. With this important personage, whose characterhe well understood, he seemed determined, if possible, to maintainfriendly relations. There was a deep policy in this desire, to which weshall advert hereafter. The other seigniors were described in generalterms as disposed to overthrow the royal authority. They were bent uponGranvelle's downfall as the first step, because, that being accomplished, the rest would follow as a matter of course. "They intend, " said he, "toreduce the state into the form of a republic, in which the King shallhave no power except to do their bidding. " He added, that he saw withregret so many German troops gathering on the borders; for he believedthem to be in the control of the disaffected nobles of the Netherlands. Having made this grave insinuation, he proceeded in the same breath toexpress his anger at a statement said to have been made by Orange andEgmont, to the effect that he had charged them with intending to excite acivil commotion, an idea, he added, which had never entered his head. Inthe same paragraph, he poured into the most suspicious ear that everlistened to a tale of treason, his conviction that the nobles wereplanning a republic by the aid of foreign troops, and uttered a complaintthat these nobles had accused him of suspecting them. As for the Princeof Orange, he was described as eternally boasting of his influence inGermany, and the great things which he could effect by means of hisconnexions there, "so that, " added the Cardinal, "we hear no other song. "

He had much to say concerning the projects of these grandees to abolishall the councils, but that of state, of which body they intended toobtain the entire control. Marquis Berghen was represented as being atthe bottom of all these intrigues. The general and evident intention wasto make a thorough change in the form of government. The Marquis meant tocommand in every thing, and the Duchess would soon have nothing to do inthe provinces as regent for the King. In fact, Philip himself would beequally powerless, "for, " said the Cardinal, "they will have succeeded inputting your Majesty completely under guardianship. " He added, moreover, that the seigniors, in order to gain favor with the people and with theestates, had allowed them to acquire so much power, that they wouldrespond to any request for subsidies by a general popular revolt. "Thisis the simple truth, " said Granvelle, "and moreover, by the same process, in a very few days there will likewise be no religion left in the land. "When the deputies of some of the states, a few weeks later, had beenirregularly convened in Brussels, for financial purposes, the Cardinalinformed the monarch that the nobles were endeavoring to conciliate theirgood-will, by offering them a splendid series of festivities andbanquets. 

He related various anecdotes which came to his ears from time to time, all tending to excite suspicions as to the loyalty and orthodoxy of theprincipal nobles. A gentleman coming from Burgundy had lately, as heinformed the King, been dining with the Prince of Orange, with whom Hornand Montigny were then lodging. At table, Montigny called out in a veryloud voice to the strange cavalier, who was seated at a great distancefrom him, to ask if there were many Huguenots in Burgundy. No, repliedthe gentleman nor would they be permitted to exist there. "Then there canbe very few people of intelligence in that province, " returned Montigny, "for those who have any wit are mostly all Huguenots. " The Prince ofOrange here endeavored to put a stop to the conversation, saying that theBurgundians were very right to remain as they were; upon which Montignyaffirmed that he had heard masses enough lately to last him for threemonths. These things may be jests, commented Granvelle, but they are verybad ones; and 'tis evident that such a man is an improper instrument toremedy the state of religious affairs in Tournay. 

At another large party, the King was faithfully informed by the samechronicler, that Marquis Berghen had been teasing the Duke of Aerschotvery maliciously, because he would not join the league. The Duke hadresponded as he had formerly done to Egmont, that his Majesty was not toreceive laws from his vassals; adding that, for himself, he meant tofollow in the loyal track of his ancestors, fearing God and honoring theking. In short, said Granvelle, he answered them with so much wisdom, that although they had never a high opinion of his capacity, they weresilenced. This conversation had been going on before all the servants, the Marquis being especially vociferous, although the room was quite fullof them. As soon as the cloth was removed, and while some of the lackiesstill remained, Berghen had resumed the conversation. He said he was ofthe same mind as his ancestor, John of Berghen, had been, who had oncetold the King's grandfather, Philip the Fair, that if his Majesty wasbent on his own perdition, he had no disposition to ruin himself. If thepresent monarch means to lose these provinces by governing them as he didgovern them, the Marquis affirmed that he had no wish to lose the littleproperty that he himself possessed in the country. "But if, " argued theDuke of Aerschot, "the King absolutely refuse to do what you demand ofhim; what then?"--"Par la cordieu!" responded Berghen, in a rage, "wewill let him see!" whereupon all became silent. 

Granvelle implored the King to keep these things entirely to himself;adding that it was quite necessary for his Majesty to learn in thismanner what were the real dispositions of the gentlemen of the provinces. It was also stated in the same letter, that a ruffian Genoese, who hadbeen ordered out of the Netherlands by the Regent, because of a homicidehe had committed, was kept at Weert, by Count Horn, for the purpose ofmurdering the Cardinal. 

He affirmed that he was not allowed to request the expulsion of theassassin from the Count's house; but that he would take care, nevertheless, that neither this ruffian nor any other, should accomplishhis purpose. A few weeks afterwards, expressing his joy at thecontradiction of a report that Philip had himself been assassinated, Granvelle added; "I too, who am but a worm in comparison, am threatenedon so many sides, that many must consider me already dead. Nevertheless, I will endeavor, with God's help, to live as long as I can, and if theykill me, I hope they will not gain every thing. " Yet, with characteristicJesuitism, the Cardinal could not refrain, even in the very letter inwhich he detailed the rebellious demonstrations of Berghen, and themurderous schemes of Horn, to protest that he did not say these things"to prejudice his Majesty against any one, but only that it might beknown to what a height the impudence was rising. " Certainly the King andthe ecclesiastic, like the Roman soothsayers, would have laughed in eachother's face, could they have met, over the hollowness of suchdemonstrations. Granvelle's letters were filled, for the greater part, with pictures of treason, stratagem, and bloody intentions, fabricatedmostly out of reports, table-talk, disjointed chat in the carelessfreedom of domestic intercourse, while at the same time a margin wasalways left to express his own wounded sense of the injurious suspicionsuttered against him by the various subjects of his letters. "God knows, "said he to Perez, "that I always speak of them with respect, which ismore than they do of me. But God forgive them all. In times like these, one must hold one's tongue. One must keep still, in order not to stir upa hornet's nest. "

In short, the Cardinal, little by little, during the last year of hisresidence in the Netherlands, was enabled to spread a canvas before hissovereign's eye, in which certain prominent figures, highly colored bypatiently accumulated touches, were represented as driving a wholenation, against its own will, into manifest revolt. The estates and thepeople, he said, were already tired of the proceedings of the nobles, andthose personages would find themselves very much mistaken in thinkingthat men who had any thing to lose would follow them, when they began arebellion against his Majesty. On the whole, he was not desirous ofprolonging his own residence, although, to do him justice, he was notinfluenced by fear. He thought or affected to think that the situationwas one of a factitious popular discontent, procured by the intrigues ofa few ambitious and impoverished Catilines and Cethegi, not a risingrebellion such as the world had never seen, born of the slowly-awakenedwrath of, a whole people, after the martyrdom of many years. The remedythat he recommended was that his Majesty should come in person to theprovinces. The monarch would cure the whole disorder as soon as heappeared, said the Cardinal, by merely making the sign of the cross. Whether, indeed, the rapidly-increasing cancer of national discontentwould prove a mere king's evil, to be healed by the royal touch, as manypersons besides Granvelle believed, was a point not doomed to be tested. From that day forward Philip began to hold out hopes that he would cometo administer the desired remedy, but even then it was the opinion ofgood judges that he would give millions rather than make his appearancein the Netherlands. It was even the hope of William of Orange that theKing would visit the provinces. He expressed his desire, in a letter toLazarus Schwendi, that his sovereign should come in person, that he mightsee whether it had been right to sow so much distrust between himself andhis loyal subjects. The Prince asserted that it was impossible for anyperson not on the spot to imagine the falsehoods and calumnies circulatedby Granvelle and his friends, accusing Orange and his associates ofrebellion and heresy, in the most infamous manner in the world. He added, in conclusion, that he could write no more, for the mere thought of themanner in which the government of the Netherlands was carried on filledhim with disgust and rage. This letter, together with one in a similarstrain from Egmont, was transmitted by the valiant and highlyintellectual soldier to whom they were addressed, to the King of Spain, with an entreaty that he would take warning from the bitter truths whichthey contained. The Colonel, who was a most trusty friend of Orange, wrote afterwards to Margaret of Parma in the same spirit, warmly urgingher to moderation in religious matters. This application highly enragedMorillon, the Cardinal's most confidential dependent, who accordinglyconveyed the intelligence to his already departed chief, exclaiming inhis letter, "what does the ungrateful baboon mean by meddling with ouraffairs? A pretty state of things, truly, if kings are to choose orretain their ministers at the will of the people; little does he know ofthe disasters which would be caused by a relaxation of the edicts. " Inthe same sense, the Cardinal, just before his departure, which was nowimminent, wrote to warn his sovereign of the seditious character of themen who were then placing their breasts between the people and theirbutchers. He assured Philip that upon the movement of those noblesdepended the whole existence of the country. It was time that they shouldbe made to open their eyes. They should be solicited in every way toabandon their evil courses, since the liberty which they thoughtthemselves defending was but abject slavery; but subjection to a thousandbase and contemptible personages, and to that "vile animal called thepeople. "

It is sufficiently obvious, from the picture which we have now presentedof the respective attitudes of Granvelle, of the seigniors and of thenation, during the whole of the year 1563, and the beginning of thefollowing year, that a crisis was fast approaching. Granvelle was, forthe moment, triumphant, Orange, Egmont, and Horn had abandoned the statecouncil, Philip could not yet make up his mind to yield to the storm, andAlva howled defiance at the nobles and the whole people of theNetherlands. Nevertheless, Margaret of Parma was utterly weary of theminister, the Cardinal himself was most anxious to be gone, and thenation--for there was a nation, however vile the animal might be--wasbecoming daily more enraged at the presence of a man in whom, whetherjustly or falsely, it beheld the incarnation of the religious oppressionunder which they groaned. Meantime, at the close of the year, a newincident came to add to the gravity of the situation. Caspar Schetz, Baron of Grobbendonck, gave a Great dinner-party, in the month ofDecember, 1563. This personage, whose name was prominent for many yearsin the public affairs of the nation, was one of the four brothers whoformed a very opulent and influential mercantile establishment. 

He was the King's principal factor and financial agent. He was one of thegreat pillars of the Bourse at Antwerp. He was likewise a tolerablescholar, a detestable poet, an intriguing politician, and a corruptfinancier. He was regularly in the pay of Sir Thomas Gresham, to whom hefurnished secret information, for whom he procured differential favors, and by whose government he was rewarded by gold chains and presents ofhard cash, bestowed as secretly as the equivalent was conveyed adroitly. Nevertheless, although his venality was already more than suspected, andalthough his peculation, during his long career became so extensive thathe was eventually prosecuted by government, and died before the processwas terminated, the lord of Grobbendonck was often employed in mostdelicate negotiations, and, at the present epoch, was a man of muchimportance in the Netherlands. 

The treasurer-general accordingly gave his memorable banquet to adistinguished party of noblemen. The conversation, during dinner, turned, as was inevitable, upon the Cardinal. His ostentation, greediness, insolence, were fully canvassed. The wine flowed freely as it always didin those Flemish festivities--the brains of the proud and recklesscavaliers became hot with excitement, while still the odious ecclesiasticwas the topic of their conversation, the object alternately of fierceinvective or of scornful mirth. The pompous display which he affected inhis equipages, liveries, and all the appurtenances of his household, hadfrequently excited their derision, and now afforded fresh matter fortheir ridicule. The customs of Germany, the simple habiliments in whichthe retainers of the greatest houses were arrayed in that country, werecontrasted with the tinsel and glitter in which the prelate prankedhimself. It was proposed, by way of showing contempt for Granvelle, thata livery should be forthwith invented, as different as possible from hisin general effect, and that all the gentlemen present shouldindiscriminately adopt it for their own menials. Thus would the peoplewhom the Cardinal wished to dazzle with his finery learn to estimate suchgauds at their true value. It was determined that something extremelyplain, and in the German fashion, should be selected. At the same time, the company, now thoroughly inflamed with wine, and possessed by thespirit of mockery, determined that a symbol should be added to thelivery, by which the universal contempt for Granvelle should beexpressed. The proposition was hailed with acclamation, but who shouldinvent the hieroglyphical costume? All were reckless and ready enough, but ingenuity of device was required. At last it was determined to decidethe question by hazard. Amid shouts of hilarity, the dice were thrown. Those men were staking their lives, perhaps, upon the issue, but thereflection gave only a keener zest to the game. Egmont won. It was themost fatal victory which he had ever achieved, a more deadly prize eventhan the trophies of St. Quentin and Gravelingen. 

In a few days afterwards, the retainers of the house of Egmont surprisedBrussels by making their appearance in a new livery. Doublet and hose ofthe coarsest grey, and long hanging sleeves, without gold or silver lace, and having but a single ornament, comprised the whole costume. An emblemwhich seemed to resemble a monk's cowl, or a fool's cap and bells, wasembroidered upon each sleeve. The device pointed at the Cardinal, as did, by contrast, the affected coarseness of the dress. There was no doubt asto the meaning of the hood, but they who saw in the symbol moreresemblance to the jester's cap, recalled certain biting expressionswhich Granvelle had been accustomed to use. He had been wont, in the daysof his greatest insolence, to speak of the most eminent nobles as zanies, lunatics, and buffoons. The embroidered fool's cap was supposed to typifythe gibe, and to remind the arrogant priest that a Brutus, as in theolden time, might be found lurking in the costume of the fool. Howeverwitty or appropriate the invention, the livery had an immense success. According to agreement, the nobles who had dined with the treasurerordered it for all their servants. Never did a new dress become so soonthe fashion. The unpopularity of the minister assisted the quaintness ofthe device. The fool's-cap livery became the rage. Never was such a runupon the haberdashers, mercers, and tailors, since Brussels had been acity. All the frieze-cloth in Brabant was exhausted. All the serge inFlanders was clipped into monastic cowls. The Duchess at first laughedwith the rest, but the Cardinal took care that the king should be at onceinformed upon the subject. The Regent was, perhaps, not extremely sorryto see the man ridiculed whom she so cordially disliked, and, sheaccepted the careless excuses made on the subject by Egmont and by Orangewithout severe criticism. She wrote to her brother that, although thegentlemen had been influenced by no evil intention, she had thought itbest to exhort them not to push the jest too far. Already, however, shefound that two thousand pairs, of sleeves had been made, and the most shecould obtain was that the fools' caps, or monks' hoods, should in futurebe omitted from the livery. A change was accordingly made in the costume, at about the time of the cardinal's departure. 

A bundle of arrows, or in some instances a wheat-sheaf, was substitutedfor the cowls. Various interpretations were placed upon this new emblem. According to the nobles themselves, it denoted the union of all theirhearts in the King's service, while their enemies insinuated that it wasobviously a symbol of conspiracy. The costume thus amended was worn bythe gentlemen themselves, as well as by their servants. Egmont dined atthe Regent's table, after the Cardinal's departure, in a camlet doublet, with hanging sleeves, and buttons stamped with the bundle of arrows. 

For the present, the Cardinal affected to disapprove of the fashion onlyfrom its rebellious tendency. The fools' caps and cowls, he meeklyobserved to Philip, were the least part of the offence, for an injury tohimself could be easily forgiven. The wheat-sheaf and the arrow-bundles, however, were very vile things, for they betokened and confirmed theexistence of a conspiracy, such as never could be tolerated by a princewho had any regard for his own authority. 

This incident of the livery occupied the public attention, and inflamedthe universal hatred during the later months of the minister's residencein the country. Meantime the three seigniors had become very impatient atreceiving no answer to their letter. Margaret of Parma was urging herbrother to give them satisfaction, repeating to him their bittercomplaints that their characters and conduct were the subject of constantmisrepresentation to their sovereign, and picturing her own isolatedcondition. She represented herself as entirely deprived of the support ofthose great personages, who, despite her positive assurances to thecontrary, persisted in believing that they were held up to the King asconspirators, and were in danger of being punished as traitors. Philip, on his part, was conning Granvelle's despatches, filled with hints ofconspiracy, and holding counsel with Alva, who had already recommendedthe taking off several heads for treason. The Prince of Orange, whoalready had secret agents in the King's household, and was supplied withcopies of the most private papers in the palace, knew better than to bedeceived by the smooth representations of the Regent. Philip had, however, at last begun secretly to yield. He asked Alva's advice whetheron the whole it would not be better to let the Cardinal leave theNetherlands, at least for a time, on pretence of visiting his mother inBurgundy, and to invite Count Egmont to Madrid, by way of striking onelink from the chain, as Granvelle had suggested. The Duke had repliedthat he had no doubt of the increasing insolence of the three seigniors, as depicted in the letters of the Duchess Margaret, nor of theirintention to make the Cardinal their first victim; it being the regularprinciple in all revolts against the sovereign, to attack the chiefminister in the first place. He could not, however, persuade himself thatthe King should yield and Granvelle be recalled. Nevertheless, if it wereto be done at all, he preferred that the Cardinal should go to Burgundywithout leave asked either of the Duchess or of Philip; and that heshould then write; declining to return, on the ground that his life wasnot safe in the Netherlands. 

After much hesitation, the monarch at last settled upon a plan, whichrecommended itself through the extreme duplicity by which it was marked, and the complicated system of small deceptions, which it consequentlyrequired. The King, who was never so thoroughly happy or at home as whenelaborating the ingredients of a composite falsehood, now busily employedhimself in his cabinet. He measured off in various letters to the Regent, to the three nobles, to Egmont alone, and to Granvelle, certainproportionate parts of his whole plan, which; taken separately, wereintended to deceive, and did deceive nearly every person in the world, not only in his own generation, but for three centuries afterwards, butwhich arranged synthetically, as can now be done, in consequence ofmodern revelations, formed one complete and considerable lie, theobservation of which furnishes the student with a lesson in the politicalchemistry of those days, which was called Macchiavellian statesmanship. The termination of the Granvelle regency is, moreover, most important, not only for the grave and almost interminable results to which it led, but for the illustration which it affords of the inmost characters of theCardinal and "his master. "

The courier who was to take Philip's letters to the three nobles wasdetained three weeks, in order to allow Armenteros, who was charged withthe more important and secret despatches for the Duchess and Granvelle toreach Brussels first. All the letters, however, were ready at the sametime. The letter of instructions for Armenteros enjoined upon that envoyto tell the Regent that the heretics were to be chastised with renewedvigor, that she was to refuse to convoke the states-general under anypretext, and that if hard pressed, she was to refer directly to the King. With regard to Granvelle, the secretary was to state that his Majesty wasstill deliberating, and that the Duchess would be informed as to thedecision when it should be made. He was to express the royal astonishmentthat the seigniors should absent themselves from the state council, witha peremptory intimation that they should immediately return to theirposts. As they had specified no particularities against the Cardinal, theKing would still reflect upon the subject. 

He also wrote a private note to the Duchess, stating that he had not yetsent the letters for the three nobles, because he wished that Armenterosshould arrive before their courier. He, however, enclosed two notes forEgmont, of which Margaret was to deliver that one, which, in her opinion, was, under the circumstances, the best. In one of these missives the Kingcordially accepted, and in the other he politely declined Egmont's recentoffer to visit Spain. He also forwarded a private letter in his ownhand-writing to the Cardinal. Armenteros, who travelled but slowly onaccount of the state of his health, arrived in Brussels towards the endof February. Five or six days afterwards, on the 1st March, namely, thecourier arrived bringing the despatches for the seigniors. In his letterto Orange, Egmont, and Horn, the King expressed his astonishment at theirresolution to abstain from the state council. Nevertheless, said he, imperatively, fail not to return thither and to show how much more highlyyou regard my service and the good of the country than any otherparticularity whatever. As to Granvelle, continued Philip, since you willnot make any specifications, my intention is to think over the matterlonger, in order to arrange it as may seem most fitting. 

This letter was dated February 19 (1564), nearly a month later thereforethan the secret letter to Granvelle, brought by Armenteros, although allthe despatches had been drawn up at the same time and formed parts of thesame plan. In this brief note to Granvelle, however, lay the heart of thewhole mystery. 

"I have reflected much, " wrote the King, "on all that you have written meduring these last few months, concerning the ill-will borne you bycertain personages. I notice also your suspicions that if a revolt breaksout, they will commence with your person, thus taking occasion to proceedfrom that point to the accomplishment of their ulterior designs. I haveparticularly taken into consideration the notice received by you from thecurate of Saint Gudule, as well as that which you have learned concerningthe Genoese who is kept at Weert; all which has given me much anxiety aswell from my desire for the preservation of your life in which my serviceis so deeply interested, as for the possible results if any thing shouldhappen to you, which God forbid. I have thought, therefore, that it wouldbe well, in order to give time and breathing space to the hatred andrancor which those persons entertain towards you, and in order to seewhat coarse they will take in preparing the necessary remedy, for theprovinces, for you to leave the country for some days, in order to visityour mother, and this with the knowledge of the Duchess, my sister, andwith her permission, which you will request, and which I have written toher that she must give, without allowing it to appear that you havereceived orders to that effect from me. You will also beg her to write tome requesting my approbation of what she is to do. By taking this courseneither my authority nor yours will suffer prejudice; and according tothe turn which things may take, measures may be taken for your returnwhen expedient, and for whatever else there may be to arrange. "

Thus, in two words, Philip removed the unpopular minister forever. Thelimitation of his absence had no meaning, and was intended to have none. If there were not strength enough to keep the Cardinal in his place, itwas not probable that the more difficult task of reinstating him afterhis fall would be very soon attempted. It, seemed, however, to be dealingmore tenderly with Granvelle's self-respect thus to leave a vague openingfor a possible return, than to send him an unconditional dismissal. 

Thus, while the King refused to give any weight to the representations ofthe nobles, and affected to be still deliberating whether or not heshould recall the Cardinal, he had in reality already recalled him. Allthe minute directions according to which permission was to be asked ofthe Duchess to take a step which had already been prescribed by themonarch, and Philip's indulgence craved for obeying his own explicitinjunctions, were fulfilled to the letter. 

As soon as the Cardinal received the royal order, he privately madepreparations for his departure. The Regent, on the other hand, deliveredto Count Egmont the one of Philip's two letters in which that gentleman'svisit was declined, the Duchess believing that, in the present positionof affairs, she should derive more assistance from him than from the restof the seigniors. As Granvelle, however, still delayed his departure, even after the arrival of the second courier, she was again placed in asituation of much perplexity. The three nobles considered Philip's letterto them extremely "dry and laconic, " and Orange absolutely refused tocomply with the order to re-enter the state council. At a session of thatbody, on the 3d of March, where only Granvelle, Viglius, and Berlaymontwere present, Margaret narrated her fruitless attempts to persuade theseigniors into obedience to the royal orders lately transmitted, andasked their opinions. The extraordinary advice was then given, that "sheshould let them champ the bit a little while longer, and afterwards seewhat was to be done. " Even at the last moment, the Cardinal, reluctant toacknowledge himself beaten, although secretly desirous to retire, wasinclined for a parting struggle. The Duchess, however, being now armedwith the King's express commands, and having had enough of holding thereins while such powerful and restive personages were "champing the bit, "insisted privately that the Cardinal should make his immediate departureknown. Pasquinades and pamphlets were already appearing daily, each morebitter than the other; the livery was spreading rapidly through allclasses of people, and the seigniors most distinctly refused to recedefrom their determination of absenting themselves from the council so longas Granvelle remained. There was no help for it; and on the 13th of Marchthe Cardinal took his departure. Notwithstanding the mystery of the wholeproceeding, however, William of Orange was not deceived. He felt certainthat the minister had been recalled, and thought it highly improbablethat he would ever be permitted to return. "Although the Cardinal talksof coming back again soon, " wrote the Prince to Schwartzburg, "wenevertheless hope that, as he lied about his departure, so he will alsospare the truth in his present assertions. " This was the generalconviction, so far as the question of the minister's compulsory retreatwas concerned, of all those who were in the habit of receiving theirinformation and their opinions from the Prince of Orange. Many eventhought that Granvelle had been recalled with indignity and much againsthis will. "When the Cardinal, " wrote Secretary Lorich to Count Louis, "received the King's order to go, he growled like a bear, and kepthimself alone in his chamber for a time, making his preparations fordeparture. He says he shall come back in two months, but some of us thinkthey will be two long months which will eat themselves up like moneyborrowed of the Jews. " A wag, moreover, posted a large placard upon thedoor of Granvelle's palace in Brussels as soon as the minister'sdeparture was known, with the inscription, in large letters, "For sale, immediately. " In spite of the royal ingenuity, therefore, many shrewdlysuspected the real state of the case, although but very few actually knewthe truth. 

The Cardinal left Brussels with a numerous suite, stately equipages, andmuch parade. The Duchess provided him with her own mules and with asufficient escort, for the King had expressly enjoined that every careshould be taken against any murderous attack. There was no fear of suchassault, however, for all were sufficiently satisfied to see the ministerdepart. Brederode and Count Hoogstraaten were standing together, lookingfrom the window of a house near the gate of Caudenberg, to feast theireyes with the spectacle of their enemy's retreat. As soon as the Cardinalhad passed through that gate, on his way to Namur, the first stage of hisjourney, they rushed into the street, got both upon one horse, Hoogstraaten, who alone had boots on his legs, taking the saddle andBrederode the croup, and galloped after the Cardinal, with the exultationof school-boys. Thus mounted, they continued to escort the Cardinal onhis journey. At one time, they were so near his carriage, while it waspassing through a ravine, that they might have spoken to him from theheights above, where they had paused to observe him; but they pulled thecapes of their cloaks over their faces and suffered him to passunchallenged. "But they are young folk, " said the Cardinal, benignantly, after relating all these particulars to the Duchess, "and one should paylittle regard to their actions. " He added, that one of Egmont's gentlemendogged their party on the journey, lodging in the same inns with them, apparently in the hope of learning something from their conversation orproceedings. If that were the man's object, however, Granvelle expressedthe conviction that he was disappointed, as nothing could have been moremerry than the whole company, or more discreet than their conversation. 

The Cardinal began at once to put into operation the system of deception, as to his departure, which had been planned by Philip. The man who hadbeen ordered to leave the Netherlands by the King, and pushed intoimmediate compliance with the royal command by the Duchess, proceeded toaddress letters both to Philip and Margaret. He wrote from Namur to begthe Regent that she would not fail to implore his Majesty graciously toexcuse his having absented himself for private reasons at that particularmoment. He wrote to Philip from Besancon, stating that his desire tovisit his mother, whom he had not seen for nineteen years, and his natalsoil, to which he had been a stranger during the same period, had inducedhim to take advantage of his brother's journey to accompany him for a fewdays into Burgundy. He had, therefore, he said, obtained the necessarypermission from the Duchess, who had kindly promised to write veryparticularly by the first courier, to beg his Majesty's approval of theliberty which they had both taken. He wrote from the same place to theRegent again, saying that some of the nobles pretended to have learnedfrom Armenteros that the King had ordered the Cardinal to leave thecountry and not to return; all which, he added, was a very falseRenardesque invention, at which he did nothing but laugh. 

As a matter of course, his brother, in whose company he was about tovisit the mother whom he had not seen for the past nineteen years, was asmuch mystified as the rest of the world. Chantonnay was not aware thatany thing but the alleged motives had occasioned the journey, nor did heknow that his brother would perhaps have omitted to visit their commonparent for nineteen years longer had he not received the royal order toleave the Netherlands. 

Philip, on the other side, had sustained his part, in the farce with muchability. Viglius, Berlaymont, Morillon, and all the lesser cardinalistswere entirely taken in by the letters which were formally despatched tothe Duchess in reply to her own and the Cardinal's notification. "I cannot take it amiss, " wrote the King, "that you have given leave of absenceto Cardinal de Granvelle, for two or three months, according to theadvices just received from you, that he may attend to some privateaffairs of his own. " As soon as these letters had been read in thecouncil, Viglius faithfully transmitted them to Granvelle for thatpersonage's enlightenment; adding his own innocent reflection, that "thiswas very different language from that held by some people, that your mostillustrious lordship had retired by order of his Majesty. " Morillon alsosent the Cardinal a copy of the same passage in the royal despatch, saying, very wisely, "I wonder what they will all say now, since theseletters have been read in council. " The Duchess, as in duty bound, deniedflatly, on all occasions, that Armenteros had brought any lettersrecommending or ordering the minister's retreat. She conscientiouslydisplayed the letters of his Majesty, proving the contrary, and yet, saidViglius, it was very hard to prevent people talking as they liked. Granvelle omitted no occasion to mystify every one of his correspondentson the subject, referring, of course, to the same royal letters which hadbeen written for public reading, expressly to corroborate thesestatements. "You see by his Majesty's letters to Madame de Parma, " saidhe to Morillon, "how false is the report that the King had ordered me toleave Flanders, and in what confusion those persons find themselves whofabricated the story. " It followed of necessity that he should carry outhis part in the royal program, but he accomplished his task so adroitly, and with such redundancy of zeal, as to show his thorough sympathy withthe King's policy. He dissembled with better grace, even if the King didit more naturally. Nobody was too insignificant to be deceived, nobodytoo august. Emperor Ferdinand fared no better than "Esquire" Bordey. "Some of those who hate me, " he wrote to the potentate, "have circulatedthe report that I had been turned out of the country, and was never toreturn. This story has ended in smoke, since the letters written by hisMajesty to the Duchess of Parma on the subject of the leave of absencewhich she had given me. " Philip himself addressed a private letter toGranvelle, of course that others might see it, in which he affected tohave just learned that the Cardinal had obtained permission from theRegent "to make a visit to his mother, in order to arrange certain familymatters, " and gravely gave his approbation to the step. At the same timeit was not possible for the King to resist the temptation of adding oneother stroke of dissimulation to his own share in the comedy. Granvelleand Philip had deceived all the world, but Philip also deceivedGranvelle. The Cardinal made a mystery of his departure to Pollwiller, Viglius, Morillon, to the Emperor, to his own brother, and also to theKing's secretary, Gonzalo Perez; but he was not aware that Perez, whom hethought himself deceiving as ingeniously as he had done all the others, had himself drawn up the letter of recall, which the King had afterwardscopied out in his own hand and marked "secret and confidential. " YetGranvelle might have guessed that in such an emergency Philip wouldhardly depend upon his own literary abilities. 

Granvelle remained month after month in seclusion, doing his best tophilosophize. Already, during the latter period of his residence in theNetherlands, he had lived in a comparative and forced solitude. His househad been avoided by those power-worshippers whose faces are rarely turnedto the setting sun. He had, in consequence, already, before hisdeparture, begun to discourse on the beauties of retirement, the fatiguesof greatness, and the necessity of repose for men broken with the stormsof state. A great man was like a lake, he said, to which a thirstymultitude habitually resorted till the waters were troubled, sullied, andfinally exhausted. Power looked more attractive in front than in theretrospect. That which men possessed was ever of less value than thatwhich they hoped. In this fine strain of eloquent commonplace the fallingminister had already begun to moralize upon the vanity of human wishes. When he was established at his charming retreat in Burgundy, he had fullleisure to pursue the theme. He remained in retirement till his beardgrew to his waist, having vowed, according to report, that he would notshave till recalled to the Netherlands. If the report were true, saidsome of the gentlemen in the provinces, it would be likely to grow to hisfeet. He professed to wish himself blind and deaf that he might have noknowledge of the world's events, described himself as buried inliterature, and fit for no business save to remain in his chamber, fastened to his books, or occupied with private affairs and religiousexercises. He possessed a most charming residence at Orchamps, where hespent a great portion of his time. In one of his letters toVice-Chancellor Seld, he described the beauties of this retreat with muchdelicacy and vigor--"I am really not as badly off here, " said he, "as Ishould be in the Indies. I am in sweet places where I have wished for youa thousand times, for I am certain that you would think them appropriatefor philosophy and worthy the habitation of the Muses. Here are beautifulmountains, high as heaven, fertile on all their sides, wreathed withvineyards, and rich with every fruit; here are rivers flowing throughcharming valleys, the waters clear as crystal, filled with trout, breaking into numberless cascades. Here are umbrageous groves, fertilefields, lovely meadows; on the one aide great warmth, on the other aidedelectable coolness, despite the summer's heat. Nor is there any lack ofgood company, friends, and relations, with, as you well know, the verybest wines in the world. "

Thus it is obvious that the Cardinal was no ascetic. His hermitagecontained other appliances save those for study and devotion. His retiredlife was, in fact, that of a voluptuary. His brother, Chantonnay, reproached him with the sumptuousness and disorder of his establishment. He lived in "good and joyous cheer. " He professed to be thoroughlysatisfied with the course things had taken, knowing that God was aboveall, and would take care of all. He avowed his determination to extractpleasure and profit even from the ill will of his adversaries. "Behold myphilosophy, " he cried, "to live joyously as possible, laughing at theworld, at passionate people, and at all their calumnies. " It is evidentthat his philosophy, if it had any real existence, was sufficientlyEpicurean. It was, however, mainly compounded of pretence, like his wholenature and his whole life. Notwithstanding the mountains high as heaven, the cool grottos, the trout, and the best Burgundy wines in the world, concerning which he descanted so eloquently, he soon became in realitymost impatient of his compulsory seclusion. His pretence of "composinghimself as much as possible to tranquillity and repose" could deceivenone of the intimate associates to whom he addressed himself in thatedifying vein. While he affected to be blind and deaf to politics, he hadeyes and ears for nothing else. Worldly affairs were his element, and hewas shipwrecked upon the charming solitude which he affected to admire. He was most anxious to return to the world again, but he had difficultcards to play. His master was even more dubious than usual abouteverything. Granvelle was ready to remain in Burgundy as long as Philipchose that he should remain there. He was also ready to go to "India, Peru, or into the fire, " whenever his King should require any suchexcursion, or to return to the Netherlands, confronting any danger whichmight lie in his path. It is probable that he nourished for a long time ahope that the storm would blow over in the provinces, and his resumptionof power become possible. William of Orange, although more than halfconvinced that no attempt would be made to replace the minister, felt itnecessary to keep strict watch on his movements. "We must be on ourguard, " said he, "and not be deceived. Perhaps they mean to put usasleep, in order the better to execute their designs. For the presentthings are peaceable, and all the world is rejoiced at the departure ofthat good Cardinal. " The Prince never committed the error of undervaluingthe talents of his great adversary, and he felt the necessity of being onthe alert in the present emergency. "'Tis a sly and cunning bird that weare dealing with, " said he, "one that sleeps neither day nor night if ablow is to be dealt to us. " Honest Brederode, after solacing himself withthe spectacle of his enemy's departure, soon began to suspect his return, and to express himself on the subject, as usual, with ludicrousvehemence. "They say the red fellow is back again, " he wrote to CountLouis, "and that Berlaymont has gone to meet him at Namur. The Devilafter the two would be a good chase. " Nevertheless, the chances of thatreturn became daily fainter. Margaret of Parma hated the Cardinal withgreat cordiality. She fell out of her servitude to him into far morecontemptible hands, but for a brief interval she seemed to take a delightin the recovery of her freedom. According to Viglius, the court, afterGranvelle's departure, was like a school of boys and girls when thepedagogue's back is turned. He was very bitter against the Duchess forher manifest joy at emancipation. The poor President was treated with themost marked disdain by Margaret, who also took pains to show her disliketo all the cardinalists. Secretary Armenteros forbade Bordey, who wasGranvelle's cousin and dependent, from even speaking to him in public. The Regent soon became more intimate with Orange and Egmont than she hadever been with the Cardinal. She was made to see--and, seeing, she becameindignant--the cipher which she had really been during hisadministration. "One can tell what's o'clock, " wrote Morillon to thefallen minister, "since she never writes to you nor mentions your name. "As to Armenteros, with whom Granvelle was still on friendly relations, hewas restless in his endeavors to keep the once-powerful priest fromrising again. Having already wormed himself into the confidence of theRegent, he made a point of showing to the principal seigniors variousletters, in which she had been warned by the Cardinal to put no trust inthem. "That devil, " said Armenteros, "thought he had got into Paradisehere; but he is gone, and we shall take care that he never returns. " Itwas soon thought highly probable that the King was but temporizing, andthat the voluntary departure of the minister had been a deception. Ofcourse nothing was accurately known upon the subject. Philip had takengood care of that, but meantime the bets were very high that there wouldbe no restoration, with but few takers. Men thought if there had been anyroyal favor remaining for the great man, that the Duchess would not be sodecided in her demeanor on the subject. They saw that she was scarletwith indignation whenever the Cardinal's name was mentioned. They heardher thank Heaven that she had but one son, because if she had had asecond he must have been an ecclesiastic, and as vile as priests alwayswere. They witnessed the daily contumely which she heaped upon poorViglius, both because he was a friend of Granvelle and was preparing inhis old age to take orders. The days were gone, indeed, when Margaret wasso filled with respectful affection for the prelate, that she couldsecretly correspond with the Holy Father at Rome, and solicit the red hatfor the object of her veneration. She now wrote to Philip, stating thatshe was better informed as to affairs in the Netherlands than she hadever formerly been. She told her brother that all the views of Granvelleand of his followers, Viglius with the rest, had tended to produce arevolution which they hoped that Philip would find in full operation whenhe should come to the Netherlands. It was their object, she said, to fishin troubled waters, and, to attain that aim, they had ever pursued theplan of gaining the exclusive control of all affairs. That was the reasonwhy they had ever opposed the convocation of the states-general. Theyfeared that their books would be read, and their frauds, injustice, simony, and rapine discovered. This would be the result, if tranquillitywere restored to the country, and therefore they had done their best tofoment and maintain discord. The Duchess soon afterwards entertained herroyal brother with very detailed accounts of various acts of simony, peculation, and embezzlement committed by Viglius, which the Cardinal hadaided and abetted, and by which he had profited. --[Correspondence dePhil. II, i. 318-320. ]--These revelations are inestimable in a historicalpoint of view. They do not raise our estimate of Margaret's character, but they certainly give us a clear insight into the nature of theGranvelle administration. At the same time it was characteristic of theDuchess, that while she was thus painting the portrait of the Cardinalfor the private eye of his sovereign, she should address the banishedminister himself in a secret strain of condolence, and even of penitence. She wrote to assure Granvelle that she repented extremely having adoptedthe views of Orange. She promised that she would state publicly everywhere that the Cardinal was an upright man, intact in his morals and hisadministration, a most zealous and faithful servant of the King. Sheadded that she recognized the obligations she was under to him, and thatshe loved him like a brother. She affirmed that if the Flemish seigniorshad induced her to cause the Cardinal to be deprived of the government, she was already penitent, and that her fault deserved that the King, herbrother, should cut off her head, for having occasioned so great acalamity. --["Memoires de Granvelle, " tom. 33, p. 67. ]

There was certainly discrepancy between the language thus usedsimultaneously by the Duchess to Granvelle and to Philip, but Margarethad been trained in the school of Macchiavelli, and had sat at the feetof Loyola. 

The Cardinal replied with equal suavity, protesting that such a letterfrom the Duchess left him nothing more to desire, as it furnished himwith an "entire and perfect justification" of his conduct. He was awareof her real sentiments, no doubt, but he was too politic to quarrel withso important a personage as Philip's sister. 

An incident which occurred a few months after the minister's departureserved, to show the general estimation in which he was held by all ranksof Netherlanders. Count Mansfeld celebrated the baptism of his son, Philip Octavian, by a splendid series of festivities at Luxemburg, thecapital of his government. Besides the tournaments and similar sports, with which the upper classes of European society were accustomed at thatday to divert themselves, there was a grand masquerade, to which thepublic were admitted as spectators. In this "mummery" the most successfulspectacle was that presented by a group arranged in obvious ridicule ofGranvelle. A figure dressed in Cardinal's costume, with the red hat uponhis head, came pacing through the arena upon horseback. Before himmarched a man attired like a hermit, with long white beard, telling hisbeads upon a rosary, which he held ostentatiously in his hands. Behindthe mounted Cardinal came the Devil, attired in the usual guiseconsidered appropriate to the Prince of Darkness, who scourged both horseand rider with a whip of fog-tails, causing them to scamper about thelists in great trepidation, to the immense delight of the spectators. Thepractical pun upon Simon Renard's name embodied in the fox-tail, with theallusion to the effect of the manifold squibs perpetrated by that mostbitter and lively enemy upon Granvelle, were understood and relished bythe multitude. Nothing could be more hearty than the blows bestowed uponthe minister's representative, except the applause with which thissatire, composed of actual fustigation, was received. The humorousspectacle absorbed all the interest of the masquerade, and was frequentlyrepeated. It seemed difficult to satisfy the general desire to witness athorough chastisement of the culprit. 

The incident made a great noise in the country. The cardinalists feltnaturally very much enraged, but they were in a minority. No censure camefrom the government at Brussels, and Mansfeld was then and for a longtime afterwards the main pillar of royal authority in the Netherlands. Itwas sufficiently obvious that Granvelle, for the time at least, wassupported by no party of any influence. 

Meantime he remained in his seclusion. His unpopularity did not, however, decrease in his absence. More than a year after his departure, Berlaymontsaid the nobles detested the Cardinal more than ever, and would eat himalive if they caught him. The chance of his returning was dying graduallyout. At about the same period Chantonnay advised his brother to show histeeth. He assured Granvelle that he was too quiet in his disgrace, reminded him that princes had warm affections when they wished to makeuse of people, but that when they could have them too cheaply, theyesteemed them but little; making no account of men whom they wereaccustomed to see under their feet. He urged the Cardinal, in repeatedletters, to take heart again, to make himself formidable, and to risefrom his crouching attitude. All the world say, he remarked, that thegame is up between the King and yourself, and before long every one willbe laughing at you, and holding you for a dupe. 

Stung or emboldened by these remonstrances, and weary of his retirement, Granvelle at last abandoned all intention of returning to theNetherlands, and towards the end of 1565, departed to Rome, where heparticipated in the election of Pope Pius V. Five years afterwards he wasemployed by Philip to negotiate the treaty between Spain, Rome, andVenice against the Turk. He was afterwards Viceroy of Naples, and in1575, he removed to Madrid, to take an active part in the management ofthe public business, "the disorder of which, " says the Abbe Boisot, "could be no longer arrested by men of mediocre capacity. " He died inthat city on the 21st September, 1586, at the age of seventy, and wasburied at Besancon. 

We have dwelt at length on the administration of this remarkablepersonage, because the period was one of vital importance in the historyof the Netherland commonwealth. The minister who deals with the countryat an epoch when civil war is imminent, has at least as heavy aresponsibility upon his head as the man who goes forth to confront thearmed and full-grown rebellion. All the causes out of which the greatrevolt was born, were in violent operation during the epoch ofGranvelle's power. By the manner in which he comported himself inpresence of those dangerous and active elements of the comingconvulsions, must his character as a historical personage be measured. His individuality had so much to do with the course of the government, the powers placed in his hands were so vast, and his energy so untiring, that it is difficult to exaggerate the importance of his influence uponthe destiny of the country which he was permitted to rule. It is for thisreason that we have been at great pains to present his picture, sketchedas it were by his own hand. A few general remarks are, however, necessary. It is the historian's duty to fix upon one plain and definitecanvas the chameleon colors in which the subtle Cardinal produced his ownimage. Almost any theory concerning his character might be laid down andsustained by copious citations from his works; nay, the most oppositeconclusions as to his interior nature, may be often drawn from a singleone of his private and interminable letters. Embarked under his guidance, it is often difficult to comprehend the point to which we are tending. The oarsman's face beams upon us with serenity, but he looks in onedirection, and rows in the opposite course. Even thus it was threecenturies ago. Was it to be wondered at that many did not see theprecipice towards which the bark which held their all was gliding underthe same impulse?

No man has ever disputed Granvelle's talents. From friend and foe hisintellect has received the full measure of applause which it could everclaim. No doubt his genius was of a rare and subtle kind. His great powerwas essentially dramatic in its nature. He mastered the characters of themen with whom he had to deal, and then assumed them. He practised thisart mainly upon personages of exalted station, for his scheme was togovern the world by acquiring dominion over its anointed rulers. A smoothand supple slave in appearance, but, in reality, while his power lasted, the despot of his masters, he exercised boundless control by enactingtheir parts with such fidelity that they were themselves deceived. It isimpossible not to admire the facility with which this accomplishedProteus successively assumed the characters of Philip and of Margaret, through all the complicated affairs and voluminous correspondence of hisgovernment. 

When envoys of high rank were to be despatched on confidential missionsto Spain, the Cardinal drew their instructions as the Duchess--threwlight upon their supposed motives in secret letters as the King'ssister--and answered their representations with ponderous wisdom asPhilip; transmitting despatches, letters and briefs for royalconversations, in time to be thoroughly studied before the advent of theambassador. Whoever travelled from Brussels to Madrid in order to escapethe influence of the ubiquitous Cardinal, was sure to be confronted withhim in the inmost recesses of the King's cabinet as soon as he wasadmitted to an audience. To converse with Philip or Margaret was but tocommune with Antony. The skill with which he played his game, seatedquietly in his luxurious villa, now stretching forth one long arm to movethe King at Madrid, now placing Margaret upon what square he liked, anddealing with Bishops, Knight of the Fleece, and lesser dignitaries, theRichardota, the Morillons, the Viglii and the Berlaymonts, with solereference to his own scheme of action, was truly of a nature to exciteour special wonder. His aptitude for affairs and his power to readcharacter were extraordinary; but it was necessary that the affairsshould be those of a despotism, and the characters of an inferior nature. He could read Philip and Margaret, Egmont or Berlaymont, Alva or Viglius, but he had no plummet to sound the depths of a mind like that of Williamthe Silent. His genius was adroit and subtle, but not profound. He aimedat power by making the powerful subservient, but he had not the intellectwhich deals in the daylight face to face with great events and greatminds. In the violent political struggle of which his administrationconsisted, he was foiled and thrown by the superior strength of a manwhose warfare was open and manly, and who had no defence against thepoisoned weapons of his foe. 

His literary accomplishments were very great. His fecundity wasprodigious, and he wrote at will in seven languages. 'This polyglotfacility was not in itself a very remarkable circumstance, for it grewout of his necessary education and geographical position. Few men in thatage and region were limited to their mother tongue. The Prince of Orange, who made no special pretence to learning, possessed at least fivelanguages. Egmont, who was accounted an ignorant man, was certainlyfamiliar with three. The Cardinal, however, wrote not only with ease, butwith remarkable elegance, vigor and vivacity, in whatever language hechose to adopt. The style of his letters and other documents, regardedsimply as compositions, was inferior to that of no writer of the age. Hisoccasional orations, too, were esteemed models of smooth and flowingrhetoric, at an epoch when the art of eloquence was not much cultivated. Yet it must be allowed that beneath all the shallow but harmonious flowof his periods, it would be idle to search for a grain of golden sand. Not a single sterling, manly thought is to be found in all hisproductions. If at times our admiration is excited with the appearance ofa gem of true philosophy, we are soon obliged to acknowledge, on closerinspection, that we have been deceived by a false glitter. In retirement, his solitude was not relieved by serious application to any branch ofknowledge. Devotion to science and to the advancement of learning, avirtue which has changed the infamy of even baser natures than his intoglory, never dignified his seclusion. He had elegant tastes, he builtfine palaces, he collected paintings, and he discoursed of the fine artswith the skill and eloquence of a practised connoisseur; but the nectaredfruits of divine philosophy were but harsh and crabbed to him. 

His moral characteristics are even more difficult to seize than hisintellectual traits. It is a perplexing task to arrive at the intimateinterior structure of a nature which hardly had an interior. He did notchange, but he presented himself daily in different aspects. Certainpeculiarities he possessed, however, which were unquestionable. He wasalways courageous, generally calm. Placed in the midst of a nation whichhated him, exposed to the furious opposition of the most powerfuladversaries, having hardly a friend, except the cowardly Viglius and thepluralist Morillon, secretly betrayed by Margaret of Parma, insulted byrude grandees, and threatened by midnight assassins, he never lost hisself-possession, his smooth arrogance, his fortitude. He wasconstitutionally brave. He was not passionate in his resentments. To saythat he was forgiving by nature would be an immense error; but that hecould put aside vengeance at the dictate of policy is very certain. Hecould temporize, even after the reception of what he esteemed graveinjuries, if the offenders were powerful. He never manifested rancoragainst the Duchess. Even after his fall from power in the Netherlands, he interceded with the Pope in favor of the principality of Orange, whichthe pontiff was disposed to confiscate. The Prince was at that time asgood a Catholic as the Cardinal. He was apparently on good terms with hissovereign, and seemed to have a prosperous career before him. He was nota personage to be quarrelled with. At a later day, when the position ofthat great man was most clearly defined to the world, the Cardinal'sancient affection for his former friend and pupil did not prevent himfrom suggesting the famous ban by which a price was set upon his head, and his life placed in the hands of every assassin in Europe. It did notprevent him from indulging in the jocularity of a fiend, when the news ofthe first-fruits of that bounty upon murder reached his ears. It did notprevent him from laughing merrily at the pain which his old friend musthave suffered, shot through the head and face with a musket-ball, and atthe mutilated aspect which his "handsome face must have presented to theeyes of his apostate wife. " It did not prevent him from stoutlydisbelieving and then refusing to be comforted, when the recovery of theillustrious victim was announced. He could always dissemble withoutentirely forgetting his grievances. Certainly, if he were the forgivingChristian he pictured himself, it is passing strange to reflect upon theultimate fate of Egmont, Horn, Montigny, Berghen, Orange, and a host ofothers, whose relations with him were inimical. 

His extravagance was enormous, and his life luxurious. At the same timehe could leave his brother Champagny--a man, with all his faults, of anoble nature, and with scarcely inferior talents to his own--to languishfor a long time in abject poverty; supported by the charity of an ancientdomestic. His greediness for wealth was proverbial. No benefice was toolarge or too paltry to escape absorption, if placed within his possiblereach. Loaded with places and preferments, rolling in wealth, heapproached his sovereign with the whine of a mendicant. He talked of hisproperty as a "misery, " when he asked for boons, and expressed his thanksin the language of a slave when he received them. Having obtained theabbey of St. Armand, he could hardly wait for the burial of the Bishop ofTournay before claiming the vast revenues of Afflighem, assuring the Kingas he did so that his annual income was but eighteen thousand crowns. Atthe same time, while thus receiving or pursuing the vast rents of St. Armand and Afflighem, he could seize the abbey of Trulle from theexpectant hands of poor dependents, and accept tapestries and hogsheadsof wine from Jacques Lequien and others, as a tax on the benefices whichhe procured for them. Yet the man who, like his father before him, had solong fattened on the public money, who at an early day had incurred theEmperor's sharp reproof for his covetousness, whose family, beside allthese salaries and personal property, possessed already fragments of theroyal domain, in the shape of nineteen baronies and seigniories inBurgundy, besides the county of Cantecroix and other estates in theNetherlands, had the effrontery to affirm, "We have always ratherregarded the service of the master than our own particular profit. "

In estimating the conduct of the minister, in relation to the provinces, we are met upon the threshold by a swarm of vague assertions which are ofa nature to blind or distract the judgment. His character must be judgedas a whole, and by its general results, with a careful allowance forcontradictions and equivocations. Truth is clear and single, but thelights are parti-colored and refracted in the prism of hypocrisy. Thegreat feature of his administration was a prolonged conflict betweenhimself and the leading seigniors of the Netherlands. The ground of thecombat was the religious question. Let the quarrel be turned or torturedin any manner that human ingenuity can devise, it still remainsunquestionable that Granvelle's main object was to strengthen and toextend the inquisition, that of his adversaries to overthrow theinstitution. It followed, necessarily, that the ancient charters were tobe trampled in the dust before that tribunal could be triumphant. Thenobles, although all Catholics, defended the cause of the poor religiousmartyrs, the privileges of the nation and the rights of their order. Theywere conservatives, battling for the existence of certain great facts, entirely consonant to any theory of justice and divine reason--forancient constitutions which had been purchased with blood and treasure. "I will maintain, " was the motto of William of Orange. Philip, bigotedand absolute almost beyond comprehension, might perhaps have provedimpervious to any representations, even of Granvelle. Nevertheless, theminister might have attempted the task, and the responsibility is heavyupon the man who shared the power and directed the career, but who neverceased to represent the generous resistance of individuals to franticcruelty, as offences against God and the King. 

Yet extracts are drawn from his letters to prove that he considered theSpaniards as "proud and usurping, " that he indignantly denied ever havingbeen in favor of subjecting the Netherlands to the soldiers of thatnation; that he recommended the withdrawal of the foreign regiments, andthat he advised the King, when he came to the country, to bring with himbut few Spanish troops. It should, however, be remembered that heemployed, according to his own statements, every expedient which humaningenuity could suggest to keep the foreign soldiers in the provinces, that he "lamented to his inmost soul" their forced departure, and that hedid not consent to that measure until the people were in a tumult, andthe Zealanders threatening to lay the country under the ocean. "You mayjudge of the means employed to excite the people, " he wrote to Perez in1563, "by the fact that a report is circulated that the Duke of Alva iscoming hither to tyrannize the provinces. " Yet it appears by theadmissions of Del Ryo, one of Alva's blood council, that, "CardinalGranvelle expressly advised that an army of Spaniards should be sent tothe Netherlands, to maintain the obedience to his Majesty and theCatholic religion, " and that the Duke of Alva was appointed chief by theadvice of Cardinal Spinosa, and by that of Cardinal Granvelle, as, appeared by many letters written at the time to his friends. By the sameconfessions; it appeared that the course of policy thus distinctlyrecommended by Granvelle, "was to place the country under a system ofgovernment like that of Spain and Italy, and to reduce it entirely underthe council of Spain. " When the terrible Duke started on his errand ofblood and fire, the Cardinal addressed him, a letter of fulsome flattery;protesting "that all the world know that no person could be found soappropriate as he, to be employed in an affair of such importance;"urging him to advance with his army as rapidly as possible upon theNetherlands, hoping that "the Duchess of Parma would not be allowed toconsent that any pardon or concession should be made to the cities, bywhich the construction of fortresses would be interfered with, or therevocation of the charters which had been forfeited, be prevented, " andgiving him much advice as to the general measures to be adopted, and thepersons to be employed upon his arrival, in which number the infamousNoircarmes was especially recommended. In a document found among hispapers, these same points, with others, were handled at considerablelength. The incorporation of the provinces into one kingdom, of which theKing was to be crowned absolute sovereign; the establishment of, auniversal law for the Catholic religion, care being taken not to callthat law inquisition, "because there was nothing so odious to thenorthern nations as the word Spanish Inquisition, although the thing initself be most holy and just;" the abolition and annihilation of thebroad or general council in the cities, the only popular representationin the country; the construction of many citadels and fortresses to begarrisoned with Spaniards, Italians, and Germans. Such were the leadingfeatures in that remarkable paper. 

The manly and open opposition of the nobles was stigmatized as a cabal bythe offended priest. He repeatedly whispered in the royal ear that theirleague was a treasonable conspiracy, which the Attorney-General ought toprosecute; that the seigniors meant to subvert entirely the authority ofthe Sovereign; that they meant to put their King under tutelage, tocompel him to obey all their commands, to choose another prince of theblood for their chief, to establish a republic by the aid of foreigntroops. If such insinuations, distilled thus secretly into the ear ofPhilip, who, like his predecessor, Dionysius, took pleasure in listeningdaily to charges against his subjects and to the groans of his prisoners, were not likely to engender a dangerous gangrene in the royal mind, itwould be difficult to indicate any course which would produce such aresult. Yet the Cardinal maintained that he had never done the gentlemenill service, but that "they were angry with him for wishing to sustainthe authority of the master. " In almost every letter he expressed vaguegeneralities of excuse, or even approbation, while he chronicled eachdaily fact which occurred to their discredit. The facts he particularlyimplored the King to keep to himself, the vague laudation he as urgentlyrequested him to repeat to those interested. Perpetually dropping smallinnuendos like pebbles into the depths of his master's suspicious soul, he knew that at last the waters of bitterness would overflow, but heturned an ever-smiling face upon those who were to be his victims. Therewas ever something in his irony like the bland request of the inquisitorto the executioner that he would deal with his prisoners gently. Therewas about the same result in regard to such a prayer to be expected fromPhilip as from the hangman. Even if his criticisms had been uniformlyindulgent, the position of the nobles and leading citizens thus subjectedto a constant but secret superintendence, would have been too galling tobe tolerated. They did not know, so precisely as we have learned afterthree centuries, that all their idle words and careless gestures as wellas their graver proceedings, were kept in a noting book to be pored overand conned by rote in the recesses of the royal cabinet and the royalmind; but they suspected the espionage of the Cardinal, and they openlycharged him with his secret malignity. 

The men who refused to burn their fellow-creatures for a difference inreligious opinion were stigmatized as demagogues; as ruined spendthriftswho wished to escape from their liabilities in the midst of revolutionaryconfusion; as disguised heretics who were waiting for a good opportunityto reveal their true characters. Montigny, who, as a Montmorency, wasnearly allied to the Constable and Admiral of France, and was inepistolary correspondence with those relatives, was held up as aHuguenot; of course, therefore, in Philip's eye, the most monstrous ofmalefactors. 

Although no man could strew pious reflections and holy texts moreliberally, yet there was always an afterthought even in his most edifyingletters. A corner of the mask is occasionally lifted and the deadly faceof slow but abiding vengeance is revealed. "I know very well, " he wrote, soon after his fall, to Viglius, "that vengeance is the Lord's-God is mywitness that I pardon all the past. " In the same letter, nevertheless, headded, "My theology, however, does not teach me, that by enduring, one isto enable one's enemies to commit even greater wrongs. If the royaljustice is not soon put into play, I shall be obliged to right myself. This thing is going on too long-patience exhausted changes to fury. 'Tisnecessary that every man should assist himself as he can, and when Ichoose to throw the game into confusion I shall do it perhaps morenotably than the others. " A few weeks afterwards, writing to the samecorrespondent, he observed, "We shall have to turn again, and rejoicetogether. Whatever the King commands I shall do, even were I to marchinto the fire, whatever happens, and without fear or respect for anyperson I mean to remain the same man to the end--Durate;--and I have ahead that is hard enough when I do undertake any thing--'nec animismdespondeo'. " Here, certainly, was significant foreshadowing of thegeneral wrath to come, and it was therefore of less consequence that theportraits painted by him of Berghen, Horn, Montigny, and others, were sorarely relieved by the more flattering tints which he occasionallymingled with the sombre coloring of his other pictures. Especially withregard to Count Egmont, his conduct was somewhat perplexing and, at firstsight, almost inscrutable. That nobleman had been most violent inopposition to his course, had drawn a dagger upon him, had frequentlycovered him with personal abuse, and had crowned his offensive conduct bythe invention of the memorable fool's-cap: livery. Yet the Cardinalusually spoke of him with pity and gentle consideration, described him asreally well disposed in the main, as misled by others, as a "friend ofsmoke, " who might easily be gained by flattery and bribery. When therewas question of the Count's going to Madrid, the Cardinal renewed hiscompliments with additional expression of eagerness that they should becommunicated to their object. Whence all this Christian meekness in theauthor of the Ban against Orange and the eulogist of Alva? The trueexplanation of this endurance on the part of the Cardinal lies in theestimate which he had formed of Egmont's character. Granvelle had takenthe man's measure, and even he could not foresee the unparalleled crueltyand dulness which were eventually to characterize Philip's conducttowards him. On the contrary, there was every reason why the Cardinalshould see in the Count a personage whom brilliant services, illustriousrank, and powerful connexions, had marked for a prosperous future. It waseven currently asserted that Philip was about to create himGovernor-General of the Netherlands, in order to detach him entirely fromOrange, and to bind him more closely to the Crown. He was, therefore, aman to be forgiven. Nothing apparently but a suspicion of heresy coulddamage the prospects of the great noble, and Egmont was orthodox beyondall peradventure. He was even a bigot in the Catholic faith. He hadprivately told the Duchess of Parma that he had always been desirous ofseeing the edicts thoroughly enforced; and he denounced as enemies allthose persons who charged him with ever having been in favor ofmitigating the System. He was reported, to be sure, at about the time ofGranvelle's departure from the Netherlands, to have said "post pocula, that the quarrel was not with the Cardinal, but with the King, who wasadministering the public affairs very badly, even in the matter ofreligion. " Such a bravado, however, uttered by a gentleman in his cups, when flushed with a recent political triumph, could hardly outweigh inthe cautious calculations of Granvelle; distinct admissions in favor ofpersecution. Egmont in truth stood in fear of the inquisition. The heroof Gravelingen and St. Quentin actually trembled before Peter Titelmann. Moreover, notwithstanding all that had past, he had experienced a changein his sentiments in regard to the Cardinal. He frequently expressed theopinion that, although his presence in the Netherlands was inadmissible, he should be glad to see him Pope. He had expressed strong disapprobationof the buffooning masquerade by which he had been ridiculed at theMansfeld christening party. When at Madrid he not only spoke well ofGranvelle himself; but would allow nothing disparaging concerning him tobe uttered in his presence. When, however, Egmont had fallen from favor, and was already a prisoner, the Cardinal diligently exerted himself toplace under the King's eye what he considered the most damning evidenceof the Count's imaginary treason; a document with which the publicprosecutor had not been made acquainted. 

Thus, it will be seen by this retrospect how difficult it is to seize allthe shifting subtleties of this remarkable character. His sophisms even, when self-contradictory, are so adroit that they are often hard to parry. He made a great merit to himself for not having originated the newepiscopates; but it should be remembered that he did his utmost toenforce the measure, which was "so holy a scheme that he would sacrificefor its success his fortune and his life. " He refused the archbishopricof Mechlin, but his motives for so doing were entirely sordid. Hisrevenues were for the moment diminished, while his personal distinctionwas not, in his opinion, increased by the promotion. He refused to acceptit because "it was no addition to his dignity, as he was already Cardinaland Bishop of Arras, " but in this statement he committed an importantanachronism. He was not Cardinal when he refused the see of Mechlin;having received the red hat upon February 26, 1561, and having alreadyaccepted the archbishopric in May of the preceding year. He affirmed that"no man would more resolutely defend the liberty and privileges of theprovinces than he would do, " but he preferred being tyrannized by hisprince, to maintaining the joyful entrance. He complained of theinsolence of the states in meddling with the supplies; he denounced theconvocation of the representative bodies, by whose action alone, whatthere was of "liberty and privilege" in the land could be guarded; herecommended the entire abolition of the common councils in the cities. Hedescribed himself as having always combated the opinion that "any thingcould be accomplished by terror, death and violence, " yet he recommendedthe mission of Alva, in whom "terror, death, and violence" wereincarnate. He was indignant that he should be accused of having advisedthe introduction of the Spanish inquisition; but his reason was that theterm sounded disagreeably in northern ears, while the thing was mostcommendable. He manifested much anxiety that the public should bedisabused of their fear of the Spanish inquisition, but he was theindefatigable supporter of the Netherland inquisition, which Philipdeclared with reason to be "the more pitiless institution" of the two. Hewas the author, not of the edicts, but of their re-enactment, verballyand literally, in all the horrid extent to which they had been carried byCharles the Fifth; and had recommended the use of the Emperor's name tosanctify the infernal scheme. He busied himself personally in theexecution of these horrible laws, even when judge and hangman slackened. To the last he denounced all those "who should counsel his Majesty topermit a moderation of the edicts, " and warned the King that if he shouldconsent to the least mitigation of their provisions, things would goworse in the provinces than in France. He was diligent in establishingthe reinforced episcopal inquisition side by side with these edicts, andwith the papal inquisition already in full operation. He omitted nooccasion of encouraging the industry of all these various branches in thebusiness of persecution. When at last the loud cry from the oppressedinhabitants of Flanders was uttered in unanimous denunciation by the fourestates of that province of the infamous Titelmann, the Cardinal's voice, from the depths of his luxurious solitude, was heard, not in sympathywith the poor innocent wretches, who were daily dragged from their humblehomes to perish by sword and fire, but in pity for the inquisitor who wasdoing the work of hell. "I deeply regret, " he wrote to Viglius, "that thestates of Flanders should be pouting at inquisitor Titelmann. Truly hehas good zeal, although sometimes indiscreet and noisy; still he must besupported, lest they put a bridle upon him, by which his authority willbe quite enervated. " The reader who is acquainted with the personality ofPeter Titelmann can decide as to the real benignity of the joyousepicurean who could thus commend and encourage such a monster of cruelty. 

If popularity be a test of merit in a public man, it certainly could notbe claimed by the Cardinal. From the moment when Gresham declared him tobe "hated of all men, " down to the period of his departure, the odiumresting upon him had been rapidly extending: He came to the country withtwo grave accusations resting upon his name. The Emperor Maximilianasserted that the Cardinal had attempted to take his life by poison, andhe persisted in the truth of the charge thus made by him, till the day ofhis death. Another accusation was more generally credited. He was theauthor of the memorable forgery by which the Landgrave Philip of Hessehad been entrapped into his long imprisonment. His course in and towardsthe Netherlands has been sufficiently examined. Not a single charge hasbeen made lightly, but only after careful sifting of evidence. Moreoverthey are all sustained mainly from the criminal's own lips. Yet when thesecrecy of the Spanish cabinet and the Macchiavellian scheme of policy bywhich the age was characterized are considered, it is not strange thatthere should have been misunderstandings and contradictions with regardto the man's character till a full light had been thrown upon it by thedisinterment of ancient documents. The word "Durate, " which was theCardinals device, may well be inscribed upon his mask, which has at lastbeen torn aside, but which was formed of such durable materials, that ithas deceived the world for three centuries. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 Attempting to swim in two waters Dissimulation and delay Excited with the appearance of a gem of true philosophy Insinuating suspicions when unable to furnish evidence Maintaining the attitude of an injured but forgiving Christian More accustomed to do well than to speak well Perpetually dropping small innuendos like pebbles Procrastination was always his first refuge They had at last burned one more preacher alive

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 9. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER V. 1564-1565

 Return of the three seigniors to the state council--Policy of Orange--Corrupt character of the government--Efforts of the Prince in favor of reform--Influence of Armenteros--Painful situation of Viglius--His anxiety to retire--Secret charges against him transmitted by the Duchess to Philip--Ominous signs of the times-- Attention of Philip to the details of persecution--Execution of Fabricius, and tumult at Antwerp--Horrible cruelty towards the Protestants--Remonstrance of the Magistracy of Bruges and of the four Flemish estates against Titelmann--Obduracy of Philip--Council of Trent--Quarrel for precedence between the French and Spanish envoys--Order for the publication of the Trent decrees in the Netherlands--Opposition to the measure--Reluctance of the Duchess-- Egmont accepts a mission to Spain--Violent debate in the council concerning his instructions--Remarkable speech of Orange--Apoplexy of Viglius--Temporary appointment of Hopper--Departure of Egmont-- Disgraceful scene at Cambray--Character of the Archbishop--Egmont in Spain--Flattery and bribery--Council of Doctors--Vehement declarations of Philip--His instructions to Egmont at his departure --Proceedings of Orange in regard to his principality--Egmont's report to the state council concerning his mission--His vainglory-- Renewed orders from Philip to continue the persecution--Indignation of Egmont--Habitual dissimulation of the King--Reproof of Egmont by Orange--Assembly of doctors in Brussels--Result of their deliberations transmitted to Philip--Universal excitement in the Netherlands--New punishment for heretics--Interview at Bayonne between Catharine de Medici and her daughter, the Queen of Spain-- Mistaken views upon this subject--Diplomacy of Alva--Artful conduct of Catharine--Stringent letters from Philip to the Duchess with regard to the inquisition--Consternation of Margaret and of Viglius --New proclamation of the Edicts, the Inquisition, and the Council of Trent--Fury of the people--Resistance of the leading seigniors and of the Brabant Council--Brabant declared free of the inquisition--Prince Alexander of Parma betrothed to Donna Maria of Portugal--Her portrait--Expensive preparations for the nuptials-- Assembly of the Golden Fleece--Oration of Viglius--Wedding of Prince Alexander. 

The remainder of the year, in the spring of which the Cardinal had leftthe Netherlands, was one of anarchy, confusion, and corruption. At firstthere had been a sensation of relief. 

Philip had exchanged letters of exceeding amity with Orange, Egmont, andHorn. These three seigniors had written, immediately upon Granvelle'sretreat, to assure the King of their willingness to obey the royalcommands, and to resume their duties at the state council. They had, however, assured the Duchess that the reappearance of the Cardinal in thecountry would be the signal for their instantaneous withdrawal. Theyappeared at the council daily, working with the utmost assiduity oftentill late into the night. Orange had three great objects in view, byattaining which the country, in his opinion, might yet be saved, and thethreatened convulsions averted. These were to convoke the states-general, to moderate or abolish the edicts, and to suppress the council of financeand the privy council, leaving only the council of state. The two firstof these points, if gained, would, of course, subvert the whole absolutepolicy which Philip and Granvelle had enforced; it was, therefore, hardlyprobable that any impression would be made upon the secret determinationof the government in these respects. As to the council of state, thelimited powers of that body, under the administration of the Cardinal, had formed one of the principal complaints against that minister. Thejustice and finance councils were sinks of iniquity. The most barefaceddepravity reigned supreme. A gangrene had spread through the wholegovernment. The public functionaries were notoriously and outrageouslyvenal. The administration of justice had been poisoned at the fountain, and the people were unable to slake their daily thirst at the pollutedstream. There was no law but the law of the longest purse. The highestdignitaries of Philip's appointment had become the most mercenaryhucksters who ever converted the divine temple of justice into a den ofthieves. Law was an article of merchandise, sold by judges to the highestbidder. A poor customer could obtain nothing but stripes andimprisonment, or, if tainted with suspicion of heresy, the fagot or thesword, but for the rich every thing was attainable. Pardons for the mostatrocious crimes, passports, safe conducts, offices of trust and honor, were disposed of at auction to the highest bidder. Against all this seaof corruption did the brave William of Orange set his breast, undauntedand unflinching. Of all the conspicuous men in the land, he was the onlyone whose worst enemy had never hinted through the whole course of hispublic career, that his hands had known contamination. His honor was everuntarnished by even a breath of suspicion. The Cardinal could accuse himof pecuniary embarrassment, by which a large proportion of his revenueswere necessarily diverted to the liquidation of his debts, but he couldnot suggest that the Prince had ever freed himself from difficulties byplunging his hands into the public treasury, when it might easily havebeen opened to him. 

It was soon, however, sufficiently obvious that as desperate a strugglewas to be made with the many-headed monster of general corruption as withthe Cardinal by whom it had been so long fed and governed. The Prince wasaccused of ambition and intrigue. It was said that he was determined toconcentrate all the powers of government in the state council, which wasthus to become an omnipotent and irresponsible senate, while the Kingwould be reduced to the condition of a Venetian Doge. It was, of course, suggested that it was the aim of Orange to govern the new Tribunal ofTen. No doubt the Prince was ambitious. Birth, wealth, genius, and virtuecould not have been bestowed in such eminent degree on any man withoutcarrying with them the determination to assert their value. It was nothis wish so much as it was the necessary law of his being to impresshimself upon his age and to rule his fellow-men. But he practised no artsto arrive at the supremacy which he felt must always belong to him, whatever might be his nominal position in the political hierarchy. He wasalready, although but just turned of thirty years, vastly changed fromthe brilliant and careless grandee, as he stood at the hour of theimperial abdication. He was becoming careworn in face, thin of figure, sleepless of habit. The wrongs of which he was the daily witness, theabsolutism, the cruelty, the rottenness of the government, had marked hisface with premature furrows. "They say that the Prince is very sad, "wrote Morillon to Granvelle; "and 'tis easy to read as much in his face. They say he can not sleep. " Truly might the monarch have taken warningthat here was a man who was dangerous, and who thought too much. "Sleekheaded men, and such as slept o' nights, " would have been moreeligible functionaries, no doubt, in the royal estimation, but, for abrief period, the King was content to use, to watch, and to suspect theman who was one day to be his great and invincible antagonist. Hecontinued assiduous at the council, and he did his best, by entertainingnobles and citizens at his hospitable mansion, to cultivate goodrelations with large numbers of his countrymen. He soon, however, hadbecome disgusted with the court. Egmont was more lenient to the foulpractices which prevailed there, and took almost a childish pleasure indining at the table of the Duchess, dressed, as were many of the youngernobles, in short camlet doublet with the wheat-sheaf buttons. 

The Prince felt more unwilling to compromise his personal dignity bycountenancing the flagitious proceedings and the contemptible supremacyof Armenteros, and it was soon very obvious, therefore, that Egmont was agreater favorite at court than Orange. At the same time the Count wasalso diligently cultivating the good graces of the middle and lowerclasses in Brussels, shooting with the burghers at the popinjay, callingevery man by his name, and assisting at jovial banquets in town-house orguild-hall. The Prince, although at times a necessary partaker also inthese popular amusements, could find small cause for rejoicing in theaspect of affairs. When his business led him to the palace, he wassometimes forced to wait in the ante-chamber for an hour, while SecretaryArmenteros was engaged in private consultation with Margaret upon themost important matters of administration. It could not be otherwise thangalling to the pride and offensive to the patriotism of the Prince, tofind great public transactions entrusted to such hands. Thomas deArmenteros was a mere private secretary--a simple clerk. He had no rightto have cognizance of important affairs, which could only come before hisMajesty's sworn advisers. He was moreover an infamous peculator. He wasrolling up a fortune with great rapidity by his shameless traffic inbenefices, charges, offices, whether of church or state. His name ofArmenteros was popularly converted into Argenteros, in order to symbolizethe man who was made of public money. His confidential intimacy with theDuchess procured for him also the name of "Madam's barber, " in allusionto the famous ornaments of Margaret's upper lip, and to the celebratedinfluence enjoyed by the barbers of the Duke of Savoy, and of Louis theEleventh. This man sold dignities and places of high responsibility atpublic auction. The Regent not only connived at these proceedings, whichwould have been base enough, but she was full partner in the disgracefulcommerce. Through the agency of the Secretary, she, too, was amassing alarge private fortune. "The Duchess has gone into the business of vendingplaces to the highest bidders, " said Morillon, "with the bit between herteeth. " The spectacle presented at the council-board was oftensufficiently repulsive not only to the cardinalists, who were treatedwith elaborate insolence, but to all men who loved honor and justice, orwho felt an interest in the prosperity of government. There was nothingmajestic in the appearance of the Duchess, as she sat conversing apartwith Armenteros, whispering, pinching, giggling, or disputing, whileimportant affairs of state were debated, concerning which the Secretaryhad no right to be informed. It was inevitable that Orange should beoffended to the utmost by such proceedings, although he was himselftreated with comparative respect. As for the ancient adherents ofGranvelle, the Bordeys, Baves, and Morillons, they were forbidden by thefavorite even to salute him in the streets. Berlaymont was treated by theDuchess with studied insult. "What is the man talking about?" she wouldask with languid superciliousness, if he attempted to express his opinionin the state-council. Viglius, whom Berlaymont accused of doing his best, without success, to make his peace with the seigniors, was in even stillgreater disgrace than his fellow-cardinalists. He longed, he said, to bein Burgundy, drinking Granvelle's good wine. His patience under the dailyinsults which he received from the government made him despicable in theeyes of his own party. He was described by his friends as pusillanimousto an incredible extent, timid from excess of riches, afraid of his ownshadow. He was becoming exceedingly pathetic, expressing frequently adesire to depart and end his days in peace. His faithful Hopper sustainedand consoled him, but even Joachim could not soothe his sorrows when hereflected that after all the work performed by himself and colleagues, "they had only been beating the bush for others, " while their own sharein the spoils had been withheld. Nothing could well be more contumeliousthan Margaret's treatment of the learned Frisian. When other councillorswere summoned to a session at three o'clock, the President was invited atfour. It was quite impossible for him to have an audience of the Duchessexcept in the presence of the inevitable Armenteras. He was not allowedto open his mouth, even when he occasionally plucked up heart enough toattempt the utterance of his opinions. His authority was completely dead. Even if he essayed to combat the convocation of the states-general by thearguments which the Duchess, at his suggestion, had often used for thepurpose, he was treated with the same indifference. "The poor President, "wrote Granvelle to the King's chief secretary, Gonzalo Perez, "is afraid, as I hear, to speak a word, and is made to write exactly what they tellhim. " At the same time the poor President, thus maltreated and mortified, had the vanity occasionally to imagine himself a bold and formidablepersonage. The man whom his most intimate friends described as afraid ofhis own shadow, described himself to Granvelle as one who went his owngait, speaking his mind frankly upon every opportunity, and compellingpeople to fear him a little, even if they did not love him. But theCardinal knew better than to believe in this magnanimous picture of thedoctor's fancy. 

Viglius was anxious to retire, but unwilling to have the appearance ofbeing disgraced. He felt instinctively, although deceived as to theactual facts, that his great patron had been defeated and banished. Hedid not wish to be placed in the same position. He was desirous, as hepiously expressed himself, of withdrawing from the world, "that he mightbalance his accounts with the Lord, before leaving the lodgings of life. "He was, however, disposed to please "the master" as well as the Lord. Hewished to have the royal permission to depart in peace. In his own loftylanguage, he wished to be sprinkled on taking his leave "with the holywater of the court. " Moreover, he was fond of his salary, although hedisliked the sarcasms of the Duchess. Egmont and others had advised himto abandon the office of President to Hopper, in order, as he was gettingfeeble, to reserve his whole strength for the state-council. Viglius didnot at all relish the proposition. He said that by giving up the seals, and with them the rank and salary which they conferred, he should becomea deposed saint. He had no inclination, as long as he remained on theground at all, to part with those emoluments and honors, and to beconverted merely into the "ass of the state-council. " He had, however, with the sagacity of an old navigator, already thrown out his anchor intothe best holding-ground during the storms which he foresaw were soon tosweep the state. Before the close of the year which now occupies, thelearned doctor of laws had become a doctor of divinity also; and hadalready secured, by so doing, the wealthy prebend of Saint Bavon ofGhent. This would be a consolation in the loss of secular dignities, anda recompence for the cold looks of the Duchess. He did not scruple toascribe the pointed dislike which Margaret manifested towards him to theawe in which she stood of his stern integrity of character. The truereason why Armenteros and the Duchess disliked him was because, in hisown words, "he was not of their mind with regard to lotteries, the saleof offices, advancement to abbeys, and many other things of the kind, bywhich they were in such a hurry to make their fortune. " Upon anotheroccasion he observed, in a letter to Granvelle, that "all offices weresold to the highest bidder, and that the cause of Margaret's resentmentagainst both the Cardinal and himself was, that they had so longprevented her from making the profit which she was now doing from thesale of benefices, offices, and other favors. "

The Duchess, on her part, characterized the proceedings and policy, bothpast and present, of the cardinalists as factious, corrupt, and selfishin the last degree. She assured her brother that the simony, rapine, anddishonesty of Granvelle, Viglius, and all their followers, had broughtaffairs into the ruinous condition which was then but too apparent. Theywere doing their best, she said, since the Cardinal's departure, to show, by their sloth and opposition, that they were determined to allow nothingto prosper in his absence. To quote her own vigorous expression toPhilip--"Viglius made her suffer the pains of hell. " She described him asperpetually resisting the course of the administration, and she threw outdark suspicions, not only as to his honesty but his orthodoxy. Philiplent a greedy ear to these scandalous hints concerning the lateomnipotent minister and his friends. It is an instructive lesson in humanhistory to look through the cloud of dissimulation in which the actors ofthis remarkable epoch were ever enveloped, and to watch them all stabbingfiercely at each other in the dark, with no regard to previousfriendship, or even present professions. It is edifying to see theCardinal, with all his genius and all his grimace, corresponding onfamiliar terms with Armenteros, who was holding him up to obloquy uponall occasions; to see Philip inclining his ear in pleased astonishment toMargaret's disclosures concerning the Cardinal, whom he was at the veryinstant assuring of his undiminished confidence; and to see Viglius, theauthor of the edict of 1550, and the uniform opponent of any mitigationin its horrors, silently becoming involved without the least suspicion ofthe fact in the meshes of inquisitor Titelmann. 

Upon Philip's eager solicitations for further disclosures, Margaretaccordingly informed her brother of additional facts communicated to her, after oaths of secrecy had been exchanged, by Titelmann and his colleaguedel Canto. They had assured her, she said, that there were grave doubtstouching the orthodoxy of Viglius. He had consorted with heretics duringa large portion of his life, and had put many suspicious persons intooffice. As to his nepotism, simony, and fraud, there was no doubt at all. He had richly provided all his friends and relations in Friesland withbenefices. He had become in his old age a priest and churchman, in orderto snatch the provostship of Saint Bavon, although his infirmities didnot allow him to say mass, or even to stand erect at the altar. Theinquisitors had further accused him of having stolen rings, jewels, plate, linen, beds, tapestry, and other furniture, from theestablishment, all which property he had sent to Friesland, and of havingseized one hundred thousand florins in ready money which had belonged tothe last abbe--an act consequently of pure embezzlement. The Duchessafterwards transmitted to Philip an inventory of the plundered property, including the furniture of nine houses, and begged him to command Vigliusto make instant restitution. If there be truth in the homely proverb, that in case of certain quarrels honest men recover their rights, it isperhaps equally certain that when distinguished public personages attackeach other, historians may arrive at the truth. Here certainly areedifying pictures of the corruption of the Spanish regency in theNetherlands, painted by the President of the state-council, and of thedishonesty of the President painted by the Regent. 

A remarkable tumult occurred in October of this year, at Antwerp. ACarmelite monk, Christopher Smith, commonly called Fabricius, had left amonastery in Bruges, adopted the principles of the Reformation, and takento himself a wife. He had resided for a time in England; but, invited byhis friends, he had afterwards undertaken the dangerous charge ofgospel-teacher in the commercial metropolis of the Netherlands. He was, however, soon betrayed to the authorities by a certain bonnet dealer, popularly called Long Margaret, who had pretended, for the sake ofsecuring the informer's fee, to be a convert to his doctrines. He wasseized, and immediately put to the torture. He manfully refused to betrayany members of his congregation, as manfully avowed and maintained hisreligious creed. He was condemned to the flames, and during the intervalwhich preceded his execution, he comforted his friends by letters ofadvice, religious consolation and encouragement, which he wrote from hisdungeon. He sent a message to the woman who had betrayed him, assuringher of his forgiveness, and exhorting her to repentance. His calmness, wisdom, and gentleness excited the admiration of all. When; therefore, this humble imitator of Christ was led through the streets of Antwerp tothe stake, the popular emotion was at once visible. To the multitude whothronged about the executioners with threatening aspect, he addressed anurgent remonstrance that they would not compromise their own safety by atumult in his cause. He invited all, however, to remain steadfast to thegreat truth for which he was about to lay down his life. The crowd, asthey followed the procession of hangmen, halberdsmen, and magistrates, sang the hundred and thirtieth psalm in full chorus. As the victimarrived upon the market-place, he knelt upon the ground to pray, for thelast time. He was, however, rudely forced to rise by the executioner, whoimmediately chained him to the stake, and fastened a leathern straparound his throat. At this moment the popular indignation becameuncontrollable; stones were showered upon the magistrates and soldiers, who, after a slight resistance, fled for their lives. The foremost of theinsurgents dashed into the enclosed arena, to rescue the prisoner. It wastoo late. The executioner, even as he fled, had crushed the victim's headwith a sledge hammer, and pierced him through and through with a poniard. Some of the bystanders maintained afterwards that his fingers and lipswere seen to move, as if in feeble prayer, for a little time longer, until, as the fire mounted, he fell into the flames. For the remainder ofthe day, after the fire had entirely smouldered to ashes, the charred andhalf-consumed body of the victim remained on the market-place, a ghastlyspectacle to friend and foe. It was afterwards bound to a stone and castinto the Scheld. Such was the doom of Christopher Fabricius, for havingpreached Christianity in Antwerp. During the night an anonymous placard, written with blood, was posted upon the wall of the town-house, statingthat there were men in the city who would signally avenge his murder. Nothing was done, however, towards the accomplishment of the threat. TheKing, when he received the intelligence of the transaction, was furiouswith indignation, and wrote savage letters to his sister, commandinginstant vengeance to be taken upon all concerned in so foul a riot. Asone of the persons engaged had, however, been arrested and immediatelyhanged, and as the rest had effected their escape, the affair wassuffered to drop. 

The scenes of outrage, the frantic persecutions, were fast becoming toohorrible to be looked upon by Catholic or Calvinist. The prisons swarmedwith victims, the streets were thronged with processions to the stake. The population of thriving cities, particularly in Flanders, weremaddened by the spectacle of so much barbarity inflicted, not uponcriminals, but usually upon men remarkable for propriety of conduct andblameless lives. It was precisely at this epoch that the burgomasters, senators, and council of the city of Bruges (all Catholics) humblyrepresented to the Duchess Regent, that Peter Titelmann, inquisitor ofthe Faith, against all forms of law, was daily exercising inquisitionamong the inhabitants, not only against those suspected or accused ofheresy, but against all, however untainted their characters; that he wasdaily citing before him whatever persons he liked, men or women, compelling them by force to say whatever it pleased him; that he wasdragging people from their houses, and even from the sacred precincts ofthe church; often in revenge for verbal injuries to himself, always underpretext of heresy, and without form or legal warrant of any kind. Theytherefore begged that he might be compelled to make use of preparatoryexaminations with the co-operation of the senators of the city, to sufferthat witnesses should make their depositions without being intimidated bymenace, and to conduct all his subsequent proceedings according to legalforms, which he had uniformly violated; publicly declaring that he wouldconduct himself according to his own pleasure. 

The four estates of Flanders having, in a solemn address to the King, represented the same facts, concluded their brief but vigorousdescription of Titelmann's enormities by calling upon Philip to suppressthese horrible practices, so manifestly in violation of the ancientcharters which he had sworn to support. It may be supposed that theappeal to Philip would be more likely to call down a royal benedictionthan the reproof solicited upon the inquisitor's head. In the privycouncil, the petitions and remonstrances were read, and, in the words ofthe President, "found to be in extremely bad taste. " In the debate whichfollowed, Viglius and his friends recalled to the Duchess, in earnestlanguage, the decided will of the King, which had been so oftenexpressed. A faint representation was made, on the other hand, of thedangerous consequences, in case the people were driven to a still deeperdespair. The result of the movement was but meagre. The Duchess announcedthat she could do nothing in the matter of the request until furtherinformation, but that meantime she had charged Titelmann to conducthimself in his office "with discretion and modesty. " The discretion andmodesty, however, never appeared in any modification of the inquisitor'sproceedings, and he continued unchecked in his infamous career untildeath, which did not occur till several years afterwards. In truth, Margaret was herself in mortal fear of this horrible personage. Hebesieged her chamber door almost daily, before she had risen, insistingupon audiences which, notwithstanding her repugnance to the man, she didnot dare to refuse. "May I perish, " said Morillon, "if she does not standin exceeding awe of Titelmann. " Under such circumstances, sustained bythe King in Spain, the Duchess in Brussels, the privy council, and by aleading member of what had been thought the liberal party, it was notdifficult for the inquisition to maintain its ground, notwithstanding thesolemn protestations of the estates and the suppressed curses of thepeople. 

Philip, so far from having the least disposition to yield in the matterof the great religious persecution, was more determined as to his coursethan ever. He had already, as easy as August of this year, despatchedorders to the Duchess that the decrees of the Council of Trent should bepublished and enforced throughout the Netherlands. The memorable quarrelas to precedency between the French and Spanish delegates had given somehopes of a different determination. Nevertheless, those persons whoimagined that, in consequence of this quarrel of etiquette, Philip wouldslacken in his allegiance to the Church, were destined to be bitterlymistaken. He informed his sister that, in the common cause ofChristianity, he should not be swayed by personal resentments. 

How, indeed, could a different decision be expected? His envoy at Rome, as well as his representatives at the council, had universally repudiatedall doubts as to the sanctity of its decrees. "To doubt the infallibilityof the council, as some have dared to do, " said Francis de Vargas, "andto think it capable of error, is the most devilish heresy of all. "Nothing could so much disturb and scandalize the world as such asentiment. Therefore the Archbishop of Granada told, very properly, theBishop of Tortosa, that if he should express such an opinion in Spain, they would burn him. These strenuous notions were shared by the King. Therefore, although all Europe was on tip-toe with expectation to see howPhilip would avenge himself for the slight put upon his ambassador, Philip disappointed all Europe. 

In August, 1564, he wrote to the Duchess Regent, that the decrees were tobe proclaimed and enforced without delay. They related to three subjects, the doctrines to be inculcated by the Church, the reformation ofecclesiastical moral, and the education of the people. General policeregulations were issued at the same time, by which heretics were to beexcluded from all share in the usual conveniences of society, and were infact to be strictly excommunicated. Inns were to receive no guests, schools no children, alms-houses no paupers, grave-yards no dead bodies, unless guests, children, paupers, and dead bodies were furnished with themost satisfactory proofs of orthodoxy. Midwives of unsuspected Romanismwere alone to exercise their functions, and were bound to give noticewithin twenty-four hours of every birth which occurred; the parish clerkswere as regularly to record every such addition to the population, andthe authorities to see that Catholic baptism was administered in eachcase with the least possible delay. Births, deaths, and marriages couldonly occur with validity under the shadow of the Church. No human beingcould consider himself born or defunct unless provided with a priest'scertificate. The heretic was excluded, so far as ecclesiastical dogmacould exclude him, from the pale of humanity, from consecrated earth, andfrom eternal salvation. 

The decrees contained many provisions which not only conflicted with theprivileges of the provinces, but with the prerogatives of the sovereign. For this reason many of the lords in council thought that at least theproper exceptions should be made upon their promulgation. This was alsothe opinion of the Duchess, but the King, by his letters of October, andNovember (1564), expressly prohibited any alteration in the ordinances, and transmitted a copy of the form according to which the canons had beenpublished in Spain, together with the expression of his desire that asimilar course should be followed in the Netherlands. Margaret of Parmawas in great embarrassment. It was evident that the publication could nolonger be deferred. Philip had issued his commands, but grave senatorsand learned doctors of the university had advised strongly in favor ofthe necessary exceptions. The extreme party, headed by Viglius, were infavor of carrying out the royal decisions. They were overruled, and theDuchess was induced to attempt a modification, if her brother'spermission could be obtained. The President expressed the opinion thatthe decrees, even with the restrictions proposed, would "give nocontentment to the people, who, moreover, had no right to meddle withtheology. " The excellent Viglius forgot, however, that theology had beenmeddling altogether too much with the people to make it possible that thepublic attention should be entirely averted from the subject. Men andwomen who might be daily summoned to rack, stake, and scaffold, in thecourse of these ecclesiastical arrangements, and whose births, deaths, marriages, and position in the next world, were now to be formallydecided upon, could hardly be taxed with extreme indiscretion, if theydid meddle with the subject. 

In the dilemma to which the Duchess was reduced, she again bethoughtherself of a special mission to Spain. At the end of the year (1564), itwas determined that Egmont should be the envoy. Montigny excused himselfon account of private affairs; Marquis Berghen "because of hisindisposition and corpulence. " There was a stormy debate in council afterEgmont had accepted the mission and immediately before his departure. Viglius had been ordered to prepare the Count's instructions. Havingfinished the rough draught, he laid it before the board. The paper wasconceived in general terms and might mean any thing or nothing. Nocriticism upon its language was, however, offered until it came to theturn of Orange to vote upon the document. Then, however, William theSilent opened his lips, and poured forth a long and vehement discourse, such as he rarely pronounced, but such as few except himself could utter. There was no shuffling, no disguise, no timidity in his language. He tookthe ground boldly that the time had arrived for speaking out. The objectof sending an envoy of high rank and European reputation like the Countof Egmont, was to tell the King the truth. Let Philip know it now. Lethim be unequivocally informed that this whole machinery of placards andscaffolds, of new bishops and old hangmen, of decrees, inquisitors, andinformers, must once and forever be abolished. Their day was over. TheNetherlands were free provinces, they were surrounded by free countries, they were determined to vindicate their ancient privileges. Moreover, hisMajesty was to be plainly informed of the frightful corruption which madethe whole judicial and administrative system loathsome. The venalitywhich notoriously existed every where, on the bench, in the councilchamber, in all public offices, where purity was most essential, wasdenounced by the Prince in scathing terms. He tore the mask fromindividual faces, and openly charged the Chancellor of Brabant, EngelbertMaas, with knavery and corruption. He insisted that the King should beinformed of the necessity of abolishing the two inferior councils, and ofenlarging the council of state by the admission of ten or twelve newmembers selected for their patriotism, purity, and capacity. Above all, it was necessary plainly to inform his Majesty that the canons of Trent, spurned by the whole world, even by the Catholic princes of Germany, could never be enforced in the Netherlands, and that it would be ruinousto make the attempt. He proposed and insisted that the Count of Egmontshould be instructed accordingly. He avowed in conclusion that he was aCatholic himself and intended to remain in the Faith, but that he couldnot look on with pleasure when princes strove to govern the souls of men, and to take away their liberty in matters of conscience and religion. 

Here certainly was no daintiness of phraseology, and upon these leadingpoints, thus slightly indicated, William of Orange poured out hiseloquence, bearing conviction upon the tide of his rapid invective. Hisspeech lasted till seven in the evening, when the Duchess adjourned themeeting. The council broke up, the Regent went to supper, but the effectof the discourse upon nearly all the members was not to be mistaken. Viglius was in a state of consternation, perplexity, and despair. He feltsatisfied that, with perhaps the exception of Berlaymont, all who hadlistened or should afterwards listen to the powerful arguments of Orange, would be inevitably seduced or bewildered. The President lay awake, tossing and tumbling in his bed, recalling the Prince's oration, point bypoint, and endeavoring, to answer it in order. It was important, he felt, to obliterate the impression produced. Moreover, as we have often seen, the learned Doctor valued himself upon his logic. 

It was absolutely necessary, therefore, that in his reply, next day, hiseloquence should outshine that of his antagonist. The President thuspassed a feverish and uncomfortable night, pronouncing and listening toimaginary harangues. With the dawn of day he arose and proceeded to dresshimself. The excitement of the previous evening and the subsequentsleeplessness of his night had, however, been too much for his feeble andslightly superannuated frame. Before he had finished his toilet, a strokeof apoplexy stretched him senseless upon the floor. His servants, whenthey soon afterwards entered the apartment, found him rigid, and to allappearance dead. After a few days, however, he recovered his physicalsenses in part, but his reason remained for a longer time shattered, andwas never perhaps fully restored to its original vigor. 

This event made it necessary that his place in the council should besupplied. Viglius had frequently expressed intentions of retiring, ameasure to which he could yet never fully make up his mind. His place wasnow temporarily supplied by his friend and countryman, Joachim Hopper, like himself a Frisian doctor of ancient blood and extensiveacquirements, well versed in philosophy and jurisprudence; a professor ofLouvain and a member of the Mechlin council. He was likewise the originalfounder and projector of Douay University, an institution which atPhilip's desire he had successfully organized in 1556, in order that aFrench university might be furnished for Walloon youths, as a substitutefor the seductive and poisonous Paris. For the rest, Hopper was a mereman of routine. He was often employed in private affairs by Philip, without being entrusted with the secret at the bottom of them. His mindwas a confused one, and his style inexpressibly involved and tedious. "Poor master Hopper, " said Granvelle, "did not write the best French inthe world; may the Lord forgive him. He was learned in letters, but knewvery little of great affairs. " His manners were as cringing as hisintellect was narrow. He never opposed the Duchess, so that hiscolleagues always called him Councillor "Yes, Madam, " and he did his bestto be friends with all the world. 

In deference to the arguments of Orange, the instructions for Egmont wereaccordingly considerably modified from the original draughts of Viglius. As drawn up by the new President, they contained at least a few hints tohis Majesty as to the propriety of mitigating the edicts and extendingsome mercy to his suffering people. The document was, however, not verysatisfactory to the Prince, nor did he perhaps rely very implicitly uponthe character of the envoy. 

Egmont set forth upon his journey early in January (1565). He travelledin great state. He was escorted as far as Cambray by several nobles ofhis acquaintance, who improved the occasion by a series of tremendousbanquets during the Count's sojourn, which was protracted till the end ofJanuary. The most noted of these gentlemen were Hoogstraaten, Brederode, the younger Mansfeld, Culemburg, and Noircarmes. Before they parted withthe envoy, they drew up a paper which they signed with their blood, andafterwards placed in the hands of his Countess. In this document theypromised, on account of their "inexpressible and very singular affection"for Egmont, that if, during his mission to Spain, any evil should befalhim, they would, on their faith as gentlemen and cavaliers of honor, takevengeance, therefore, upon the Cardinal Granvelle, or upon all who shouldbe the instigators thereof. 

 [Green v. P. , Archives, etc. , i. 345, from Arnoldi, Hist. Denkwurd, p. 282. , It is remarkable that after the return of the Count from. Spain, Hoogstraaten received this singular bond from the Countess, and gave it to Mansfeld, to be burned in his presence. Mansfeld, however, advised keeping it, on account of Noircarmes, whose signature was attached to the document, and whom he knew to be so false and deceitful a man that it might be well to have it within their power at some future day to reproach him therewith. --Ibid. It will be seen in the sequel that Noircarmes more than justified the opinion of Mansfeld, but that the subsequent career of Mansfeld himself did not entitle him to reproach any of Philip's noble hangmen. ]

Wherever Brederode was, there, it was probable, would be much severecarousing. Before the conclusion, accordingly, of the visit to Cambray, that ancient city rang with the scandal created by a most uproariousscene. A banquet was given to Egmont and his friends in the citadel. Brederode, his cousin Lumey, and the other nobles from Brussels, were allpresent. The Archbishop of Cambray, a man very odious to the liberalparty in the provinces, was also bidden to the feast. During the dinner, this prelate, although treated with marked respect by Egmont, was theobject of much banter and coarse pleasantry by the ruder portion of theguests. Especially these convivial gentlemen took infinite pains tooverload him with challenges to huge bumpers of wine; it being thoughtvery desirable, if possible; to place the Archbishop under the table. This pleasantry was alternated with much rude sarcasm concerning the newbishoprics. The conversation then fell upon other topics, among others, naturally upon the mission of Count Egmont. Brederede observed that itwas a very hazardous matter to allow so eminent a personage to leave theland at such a critical period. Should any thing happen to the Count, theNetherlands would sustain an immense loss. The Archbishop, irritated bythe previous conversation, ironically requested the speaker to becomforted, "because, " said he, "it will always be easy to find a newEgmont. " Upon this, Brederode, beside himself with rage, cried outvehemently, "Are we to tolerate such language from this priest?"Gulemburg, too, turning upon the offender, observed, "Your observationwould be much more applicable to your own case. If you were to die, 'twould be easy to find five hundred of your merit, to replace you in thesee of Cambray. " The conversation was, to say the least, becomingpersonal. The Bishop, desirous of terminating this keen encounter ofwits, lifted a goblet full of wine and challenged Brederode to drink. That gentleman declined the invitation. After the cloth had been removed, the cup circulated more freely than ever. The revelry became fast andfurious. One of the younger gentlemen who was seated near the Bishopsnatched the bonnet of that dignitary from his head and placed it uponhis own. He then drained a bumper to his health, and passed the gobletand the cap to his next neighbor. Both circulated till they reached theViscount of Ghent, who arose from his seat and respectfully restored thecap to its owner. Brederode then took a large "cup of silver and gold, "filled it to the brim, and drained it to the confusion of CardinalGranvelle; stigmatizing that departed minister, as he finished, by anepithet of more vigor than decency. He then called upon all the companyto pledge him to the same toast, and denounced as cardinalists all thosewho should refuse. The Archbishop, not having digested the affronts whichhad been put upon him already, imprudently ventured himself once moreinto the confusion, and tried to appeal to the reason of the company. Hemight as well have addressed the crew of Comus. He gained nothing butadditional insult. Brederode advanced upon him with threatening gestures. Egmont implored the prelate to retire, or at least not to take notice ofa nobleman so obviously beyond the control of his reason. The Bishop, however, insisted--mingling reproof, menace; and somewhat imperiousdemands--that the indecent Saturnalia should cease. It would have beenwiser for him to retire. Count Hoogstraaten, a young man and small ofstature, seized the gilt laver, in which the company had dipped theirfingers before seating themselves at table: "Be quiet, be quiet, littleman, " said Egmont, soothingly, doing his best to restrain the tumult. "Little man, indeed, " responded the Count, wrathfully; "I would have youto know that never did little man spring from my race. " With those wordshe hurled the basin, water, and all, at the head of the Archbishop. Hoogstraaten had no doubt manifested his bravery before that day; he wasto display, on future occasions, a very remarkable degree of heroism; butit must be confessed that the chivalry of the noble house of Lalaing wasnot illustrated by this attack upon a priest. The Bishop was sprinkled bythe water, but not struck by the vessel. Young Mansfeld, ashamed of theoutrage, stepped forward to apologize for the conduct of his companionsand to soothe the insulted prelate. That personage, however, exasperated, very naturally, to the highest point, pushed him rudely away, crying, "Begone, begone! who is this boy that is preaching to me?" Whereupon, Mansfeld, much irritated, lifted his hand towards the ecclesiastic, andsnapped his fingers contemptuously in his face. Some even said that hepulled the archiepiscopal nose, others that he threatened his life with adrawn dagger. Nothing could well have been more indecent or more cowardlythan the conduct of these nobles upon this occasion. Their intoxication, together with the character of the victim, explained, but certainly couldnot palliate the vulgarity of the exhibition. It was natural enough thatmen like Brederode should find sport in this remarkable badgering of abishop, but we see with regret the part played by Hoogstraaten in thedisgraceful scene. 

The prelate, at last, exclaiming that it appeared that he had beeninvited only to be insulted, left the apartment, accompanied byNoircarmes and the Viscount of Ghent, and threatening that all hisfriends and relations should be charged with his vengeance. The next daya reconciliation was effected, as well as such an arrangement waspossible, by the efforts of Egmont, who dined alone with the prelate. Inthe evening, Hoogstraaten, Culemburg, and Brederode called upon theBishop, with whom they were closeted for, an hour, and the partyseparated on nominal terms of friendship. 

This scandalous scene; which had been enacted not only before manyguests, but in presence of a host of servants, made necessarily a greatsensation throughout the country. There could hardly be much differenceof opinion among respectable people as to the conduct of the noblemen whohad thus disgraced themselves. Even Brederode himself, who appeared tohave retained, as was natural, but a confused impression of thetransaction, seemed in the days which succeeded the celebrated banquet, to be in doubt whether he and his friends had merited any great amount ofapplause. He was, however, somewhat self-contradictory, although alwaysvehement in his assertions on the subject. At one time hemaintained--after dinner, of course--that he would have killed theArchbishop if they had not been forcibly separated; at other moments hedenounced as liars all persons who should insinuate that he had committedor contemplated any injury to that prelate; offering freely to fight anyman who disputed either of his two positions. 

The whole scene was dramatized and represented in masquerade at a weddingfestival given by Councillor d'Assonleville, on the marriage ofCouncillor Hopper's daughter, one of the principal parts being enacted bya son of the President-judge of Artois. It may be supposed that if sucheminent personages, in close connexion with the government, took part insuch proceedings, the riot must have been considered of a very pardonablenature. The truth was, that the Bishop was a cardinalist, and thereforeentirely out of favor with the administration. He was also a man oftreacherous, sanguinary character, and consequently detested by thepeople. He had done his best to destroy heresy in Valenciennes by fireand sword. "I will say one thing, " said he in a letter to Granvelle, which had been intercepted, "since the pot is uncovered, and the wholecookery known, we had best push forward and make an end of all theprincipal heretics, whether rich or poor, without regarding whether thecity will be entirely ruined by such a course. Such an opinion I shoulddeclare openly were it not that we of the ecclesiastical profession areaccused of always crying out for blood. " Such was the prelate's theory. His practice may be inferred from a specimen of his proceedings whichoccurred at a little later day. A citizen of Cambray, having beenconverted to the Lutheran Confession, went to the Archbishop, andrequested permission to move out of the country, taking his property withhim. The petitioner having made his appearance in the forenoon, wasrequested to call again after dinner, to receive his answer. The burgherdid so, and was received, not by the prelate, but by the executioner, whoimmediately carried the Lutheran to the market-place, and cut off hishead. It is sufficiently evident that a minister of Christ, with suchpropensities, could not excite any great sympathy, however deeplyaffronted he might have been at a drinking party, so long as anyChristians remained in the land. 

Egmont departed from Cambray upon the 30th January, his friends taking amost affectionate farewell of him; and Brederode assuring him, with athousand oaths, that he would forsake God for his service. His receptionat Madrid was most brilliant. When he made his first appearance at thepalace, Philip rushed from his cabinet into the grand hall of reception, and fell upon his neck, embracing him heartily before the Count had timeto drop upon his knee and kiss the royal hand. During the whole period ofhis visit he dined frequently at the King's private table, an honorrarely accorded by Philip, and was feasted and flattered by all the greatdignitaries of the court as never a subject of the Spanish crown had beenbefore. All vied with each other in heaping honors upon the man whom theKing was determined to honor. 

Philip took him out to drive daily in his own coach, sent him to see thewonders of the new Escorial, which he was building to commemorate thebattle of St. Quentin, and, although it was still winter, insisted uponshowing him the beauties of his retreat in the Segovian forest. Granvelle's counsels as to the method by which the "friend of smoke" wasso easily to be gained, had not fallen unheeded in his royal pupil'sears. The Count was lodged in the house of Ruy Gomez, who soon felthimself able, according to previous assurances to that effect, containedin a private letter of Armenteros, to persuade the envoy to any coursewhich Philip might command. Flattery without stint was administered. Moresolid arguments to convince the Count that Philip was the most generousand clement of princes were also employed with great effect. The royaldues upon the estate of Gaasbecque, lately purchased by Egmont, wereremitted. A mortgage upon his Seigneurie of Ninove was discharged, and aconsiderable sum of money presented to him in addition. Altogether, thegifts which the ambassador received from the royal bounty amounted to onehundred thousand crowns. Thus feasted, flattered, and laden withpresents, it must be admitted that the Count more than justified theopinions expressed in the letter of Armenteros, that he was a man easilygoverned by those who had credit with him. Egmont hardly broached thepublic matters which had brought him to Madrid. Upon the subject of theedicts, Philip certainly did not dissemble, however loudly the envoy mayhave afterwards complained at Brussels. In truth, Egmont, intoxicated bythe incense offered to him at the Spanish court, was a different man fromEgmont in the Netherlands, subject to the calm but piercing glance andthe irresistible control of Orange. Philip gave him no reason to supposethat he intended any change in the religious system of the provinces, atleast in any sense contemplated by the liberal party. On the contrary, acouncil of doctors and ecclesiastics was summoned, at whose deliberationsthe Count was invited to assist; on which occasion the King excitedgeneral admiration by the fervor of his piety and the vehemence of hisejaculations. Falling upon his knees before a crucifix, in the midst ofthe assembly, he prayed that God would keep him perpetually in the samemind, and protested that he would never call himself master of those whodenied the Lord God. Such an exhibition could leave but little doubt inthe minds of those who witnessed it as to the royal sentiments, nor didEgmont make any effort to obtain any relaxation of those religiousedicts, which he had himself declared worthy of approbation, and fit tobe maintained. As to the question of enlarging the state-council, Philipdismissed the subject with a few vague observations, which Egmont, notvery zealous on the subject at the moment, perhaps misunderstood. Thepunishment of heretics by some new method, so as to secure the pains butto take away the glories of martyrdom, was also slightly discussed, andhere again Egmont was so unfortunate as to misconceive the royal meaning, and to interpret an additional refinement of cruelty into an expressionof clemency. On the whole, however, there was not much negotiationbetween the monarch and the ambassador. When the Count spoke of business, the King would speak to him of his daughters, and of his desire to seethem provided with brilliant marriages. As Egmont had eight girls, besides two sons, it was natural that he should be pleased to find Philiptaking so much interest in looking out husbands for them. The King spoketo him, as hardly could be avoided, of the famous fool's-cap livery. TheCount laughed the matter off as a jest, protesting that it was a merefoolish freak, originating at the wine-table, and asseverating, withwarmth, that nothing disrespectful or disloyal to his Majesty had beencontemplated upon that or upon any other occasion. Had a single gentlemanuttered an undutiful word against the King, Egmont vowed he would havestabbed him through and through upon the spot, had he been his ownbrother. These warm protestations were answered by a gentle reprimand asto the past by Philip, and with a firm caution as to the future. "Let itbe discontinued entirely, Count, " said the King, as the two were drivingtogether in the royal carriage. Egmont expressed himself in handsometerms concerning the Cardinal, in return for the wholesale approbationquoted to him in regard to his own character, from the private letters ofthat sagacious personage to his Majesty. Certainly, after all this, theCount might suppose the affair of the livery forgiven. Thus amicablypassed the hours of that mission, the preliminaries for which had calledforth so much eloquence from the Prince of Orange and so nearly carriedoff with apoplexy the President Viglius. On his departure Egmont receiveda letter of instructions from Philip as to the report which he was tomake upon his arrival in Brussels, to the Duchess. After many thingspersonally flattering to himself, the envoy was directed to represent theKing as overwhelmed with incredible grief at hearing the progress made bythe heretics, but as immutably determined to permit no change of religionwithin his dominions, even were he to die a thousand deaths inconsequence. The King, he was to state, requested the Duchess forthwithto assemble an extraordinary session of the council, at which certainbishops, theological doctors, and very orthodox lawyers, were to assist, in which, under pretence of discussing the Council of Trent matter, itwas to be considered whether there could not be some new way devised forexecuting heretics; not indeed one by which any deduction should be madefrom their sufferings (which certainly was not the royal wish, nor likelyto be grateful to God or salutary to religion), but by which all hopes ofglory--that powerful incentive to their impiety--might be precluded. Withregard to any suggested alterations in the council of state, or in theother two councils, the King was to be represented as unwilling to formany decision until he should hear, at length, from the Duchess Regentupon the subject. 

Certainly here was a sufficient amount of plain speaking upon one greatsubject, and very little encouragement with regard to the other. YetEgmont, who immediately after receiving these instructions set forth uponhis return to the Netherlands, manifested nothing but satisfaction. Philip presented to him, as his travelling companion, the young PrinceAlexander of Parma, then about to make a visit to his mother in Brussels, and recommended the youth, afterwards destined to play so prominent apart in Flemish history, to his peculiar caret Egmont addressed a letterto the King from Valladolid, in which he indulged in ecstasies concerningthe Escorial and the wood of Segovia, and declared that he was returningto the Netherlands "the most contented man in the world. "

He reached Brussels at the end of April. Upon the fifth of May heappeared before the council, and proceeded to give an account of hisinterview with the King, together with a statement of the royalintentions and opinions. These were already sufficiently well known. Letters, written after the envoy's departure, had arrived before him, inwhich, while in the main presenting the same views as those contained inthe instructions to Egmont, Philip had expressed his decided prohibitionof the project to enlarge the state council and to suppress the authorityof the other two. Nevertheless, the Count made his report according tothe brief received at Madrid, and assured his hearers that the King wasall benignity, having nothing so much at heart as the temporal andeternal welfare of the provinces. The siege of Malta, he stated, wouldprevent the royal visit to the Netherlands for the moment, but it wasdeferred only for a brief period. To remedy the deficiency in theprovincial exchequer, large remittances would be made immediately fromSpain. To provide for the increasing difficulties of the religiousquestion, a convocation of nine learned and saintly personages wasrecommended, who should devise some new scheme by which the objections tothe present system of chastising heretics might be obviated. 

It is hardly necessary to state that so meagre a result to the mission ofEgmont was not likely to inspire the hearts of Orange and his adherentswith much confidence. No immediate explosion of resentment, however, occurred. The general aspect for a few days was peaceful. Egmontmanifested much contentment with the reception which he met with inSpain, and described the King's friendly dispositions towards the leadingnobles in lively colors. He went to his government immediately after hisreturn, assembled the states of Artois, in the city of Arras, anddelivered the letters sent to that body by the King. He made a speech onthis occasion, informing the estates that his Majesty had given ordersthat the edicts of the Emperor were to be enforced to the letter; addingthat he had told the King, freely, his own opinion upon the subject; inorder to dissuade him from that which others were warmly urging. Hedescribed Philip as the most liberal and debonair of princes; his councilin Spain as cruel and sanguinary. Time was to show whether the epithetsthus applied to the advisers were not more applicable to the monarch thanthe eulogies thus lavished by the blind and predestined victim. It willalso be perceived that this language, used before the estates of Artois, varied materially from his observation to the Dowager Duchess ofAerschot, denouncing as enemies the men who accused him of havingrequested a moderation of the edicts. In truth, this most vacillating, confused, and unfortunate of men perhaps scarcely comprehended thepurport of his recent negotiations in Spain, nor perceived the drift ofhis daily remarks at home. He was, however, somewhat vaingloriousimmediately after his return, and excessively attentive to business. "Hetalks like a King, " said Morillon, spitefully, "negotiates night and day, and makes all bow before him. " His house was more thronged withpetitioners, courtiers, and men of affairs, than even the palace of theDuchess. He avowed frequently that he would devote his life and hisfortune to the accomplishment of the King's commands, and declared hisuncompromising hostility to all who should venture to oppose that loyaldetermination. 

It was but a very short time, however, before a total change wasdistinctly perceptible in his demeanor. These halcyon days were soonfled. The arrival of fresh letters from Spain gave a most unequivocalevidence of the royal determination, if, indeed, any doubt could berationally entertained before. The most stringent instructions to keepthe whole machinery of persecution constantly at work were transmitted tothe Duchess, and aroused the indignation of Orange and his followers. They avowed that they could no longer trust the royal word, since, sosoon after Egmont's departure, the King had written despatches so much atvariance with his language, as reported by the envoy. There was nothing, they said, clement and debonair in these injunctions upon gentlemen oftheir position and sentiments to devote their time to the encouragementof hangmen and inquisitors. The Duchess was unable to pacify the nobles. Egmont was beside himself with rage. With his usual recklessness andwrath, he expressed himself at more than one session of the state councilin most unmeasured terms. His anger had been more inflamed by informationwhich he had received from the second son of Berlaymont, a young andindiscreet lad, who had most unfortunately communicated many secretswhich he had learned from his father, but which were never intended forEgmont's ear. 

Philip's habitual dissimulation had thus produced much unnecessaryperplexity. It was his custom to carry on correspondence through the aidof various secretaries, and it was his invariable practice to deceivethem all. Those who were upon the most confidential terms with themonarch, were most sure to be duped upon all important occasions. It hasbeen seen that even the astute Granvelle could not escape this common lotof all who believed their breasts the depositories of the royal secrets. Upon this occasion, Gonzalo Perez and Ruy Gomez complained bitterly thatthey had known nothing of the letters which had recently been despatchedfrom Valladolid, while Tisnacq and Courterville had been ignorant of thecommunications forwarded by the hands of Egmont. They avowed that theKing created infinite trouble by thus treating his affairs in one waywith one set of councillors and in an opposite sense with the others, thus dissembling with all, and added that Philip was now much astonishedat the dissatisfaction created in the provinces by the discrepancybetween the French letters brought by Egmont, and the Spanish letterssince despatched to the Duchess. As this was his regular manner oftransacting business, not only for the Netherlands, but for all hisdominions, they were of opinion that such confusion and dissatisfactionmight well be expected. 

After all, however, notwithstanding the indignation of Egmont, it must beconfessed that he had been an easy dupe. He had been dazzled by royalsmiles, intoxicated by court incense, contaminated by yet baser bribes. He had been turned from the path of honor and the companionship of thewise and noble to do the work of those who were to compass hisdestruction. The Prince of Orange reproached him to his face with havingforgotten, when in Spain, to represent the views of his associates andthe best interests of the country, while he had well remembered his ownprivate objects, and accepted the lavish bounty of the King. Egmont, stung to the heart by the reproof, from one whom he honored and whowished him well, became sad and sombre for a long time, abstained fromthe court and from society, and expressed frequently the intention ofretiring to his estates. He was, however, much governed by his secretary, the Seigneur de Bakerzeel, a man of restless, intriguing, and deceitfulcharacter, who at this period exercised as great influence over the Countas Armenteros continued to maintain over the Duchess, whose unpopularityfrom that and other circumstances was daily increasing. 

In obedience to the commands of the King, the canons of Trent had beenpublished. They were nominally enforced at Cambray, but a fierceopposition was made by the clergy themselves to the innovation inMechlin, Utrecht, and many other places. 

This matter, together with other more vitally important questions, camebefore the assembly of bishops and doctors, which, according to Philip'sinstructions, had been convoked by the Duchess. The opinion of thelearned theologians was, on the whole, that the views of the TrentCouncil, with regard to reformation of ecclesiastical morals and populareducation, was sound. There was some discordancy between the clerical andlay doctors upon other points. The seigniors, lawyers, and deputies fromthe estates were all in favor of repealing the penalty of death forheretical offences of any kind. President Viglius, with all the bishopsand doctors of divinity, including the prelates of St. Omer, Namur andYpres, and four theological professors from Louvain, stoutly maintainedthe contrary opinion. The President especially, declared himselfvehemently in favor of the death punishment, and expressed much angeragainst those who were in favor of its abolition. The Duchess, upon thesecond day of the assembly, propounded formally the question, whether anychange was to be made in the chastisement of heretics. The Prince ofOrange, with Counts Horn and Egmont, had, however, declined to take partin the discussions, on the ground that it was not his Majesty's intentionthat state councillors should deliver their opinions before strangers, but that persons from outside had been summoned to communicate theiradvice to the Council. The seigniors having thus washed their hands ofthe matter, the doctors came to a conclusion with great alacrity. It wastheir unanimous opinion that it comported neither with the service of Godnor the common weal, to make any change in the punishment, except, perhaps, in the case of extreme youth; but that, on the contrary, heretics were only to be dealt with by retaining the edicts in theirrigor, and by courageously chastising the criminals. After sitting forthe greater part of six days, the bishops and doctors of divinity reducedtheir sentiments to writing, and affixed their signatures to thedocument. Upon the great point of the change suggested in the penaltiesof heresy, it was declared that no alteration was advisable in theedicts, which had been working so well for thirty-five years. At the sametime it was suggested that "some persons, in respect to their age andquality, might be executed or punished more or less rigorously thanothers; some by death, some by galley slavery, some by perpetualbanishment and entire confiscation of property. " The possibility was alsoadmitted, of mitigating the punishment of those who, without beingheretics or sectaries, might bring themselves within the provisions ofthe edicts, "through curiosity, nonchalance, or otherwise. " Suchoffenders, it was hinted, might be "whipped with rods, fined, banished, or subjected to similar penalties of a lighter nature. " It will beperceived by this slight sketch of the advice thus offered to the Duchessthat these theologians were disposed very carefully to strain the mercy, which they imagined possible in some cases, but which was to drop onlyupon the heads of the just. Heretics were still to be dealt with, so faras the bishops and presidents could affect their doom, with unmitigatedrigor. 

When the assembly was over, the Duchess, thus put in possession of therecorded wisdom of these special councillors, asked her constitutionaladvisers what she was to do with it. Orange, Egmont, Horn, Mansfeldreplied, however, that it was not their affair, and that their opinionhad not been demanded by his Majesty in the premises. The Duchessaccordingly transmitted to Philip the conclusions of the assembly, together with the reasons of the seigniors for refusing to take part inits deliberations. The sentiments of Orange could hardly be doubtful, however, nor his silence fail to give offense to the higher powers. Hecontented himself for the time with keeping his eyes and ears open to thecourse of events, but he watched well. He had "little leisure for amusinghimself, " as Brederode suggested. That free-spoken individual looked uponthe proceedings of the theological assembly with profound disgust. "Yourletter, " he wrote to Count Louis, "is full of those blackguards ofbishops and presidents. I would the race were extinct, like that of greendogs. They will always combat with the arms which they have ever used, remaining to the end avaricious, brutal, obstinate, ambitious, et cetera. I leave you to supply the rest. "

Thus, then, it was settled beyond peradventure that there was to be nocompromise with heresy. The King had willed it. The theologians hadadvised it. The Duchess had proclaimed it. It was supposed that withoutthe axe, the fire, and the rack, the Catholic religion would beextinguished, and that the whole population of the Netherlands wouldembrace the Reformed Faith. This was the distinct declaration of Viglius, in a private letter to Granvelle. "Many seek to abolish the chastisementof heresy, " said he; "if they gain this point, actum est de religioneCatholica; for as most of the people are ignorant fools, the hereticswill soon be the great majority, if by fear of punishment they are notkept in the true path. "

The uneasiness, the terror, the wrath of the people seemed rapidlyculminating to a crisis. Nothing was talked of but the edicts and theinquisition. Nothing else entered into the minds of men. In the streets, in the shops, in the taverns, in the fields; at market, at church, atfunerals, at weddings; in the noble's castle, at the farmer's fireside, in the mechanic's garret, upon the merchants' exchange, there was but oneperpetual subject of shuddering conversation. It was better, men began towhisper to each other, to die at once than to live in perpetual slavery. It was better to fall with arms in hand than to be tortured and butcheredby the inquisition. Who could expect to contend with such a foe in thedark?

They reproached the municipal authorities with lending themselves asinstruments to the institution. They asked magistrates and sheriffs howfar they would go in their defence before God's tribunal for theslaughter of his creatures, if they could only answer the divinearraignment by appealing to the edict of 1550. On the other hand, theinquisitors were clamorous in abuse of the languor and the cowardice ofthe secular authorities. They wearied the ear of the Duchess withcomplaints of the difficulties which they encountered in the execution oftheir functions--of the slight alacrity on the part of the variousofficials to assist them in the discharge of their duties. Notwithstanding the express command of his Majesty to that effect, theyexperienced, they said, a constant deficiency of that cheerfulco-operation which they had the right to claim, and there was perpetualdiscord in consequence. They had been empowered by papal and by royaldecree to make use of the gaols, the constables, the whole penalmachinery of each province; yet the officers often refused to act, andhad even dared to close the prisons. Nevertheless, it had been intended, as fully appeared by the imperial and royal instructions to theinquisitors, that their action through the medium of the provincialauthorities should be unrestrained. Not satisfied with theserepresentations to the Regent, the inquisitors had also made a directappeal to the King. Judocus Tiletanus and Michael de Bay addressed toPhilip a letter from Louvain. They represented to him that they were theonly two left of the five inquisitors-general appointed by the Pope forall the Netherlands, the other three having been recently converted intobishops. Daily complaints, they said, were reaching them of theprodigious advance of heresy, but their own office was becoming soodious, so calumniated, and exposed to so much resistance, that theycould not perform its duties without personal danger. They urgentlydemanded from his Majesty, therefore, additional support and assistance. Thus the Duchess, exposed at once to the rising wrath of a whole peopleand to the shrill blasts of inquisitorial anger, was tossed to and fro, as upon a stormy sea. The commands of the King, too explicit to betampered with, were obeyed. The theological assembly had met and givenadvice. The Council of Trent was here and there enforced. The edicts wererepublished and the inquisitors encouraged. Moreover, in accordance withPhilip's suggestion, orders were now given that the heretics should beexecuted at midnight in their dungeons, by binding their heads betweentheir knees, and then slowly suffocating them in tubs of water. Secretdrowning was substituted for public burning, in order that the heretic'scrown of vainglory, which was thought to console him in his agony, mightnever be placed upon his head. 

In the course of the summer, Magaret wrote to her brother that thepopular frenzy was becoming more and more intense. The people were cryingaloud, she said, that the Spanish inquisition, or a worse than Spanishinquisition, had been established among them by means of bishops andecclesiastics. She urged Philip to cause the instructions for theinquisitors to be revised. Egmont, she said, was vehement in expressinghis dissatisfaction at the discrepancy between Philip's language to himby word of mouth and that of the royal despatches on the religiousquestion. The other seigniors were even more indignant. 

While the popular commotion in the Netherlands was thus fearfullyincreasing, another circumstance came to add to the prevailingdiscontent. The celebrated interview between Catharine de Medici and herdaughter, the Queen of Spain, occurred in the middle of the month ofJune, at Bayonne. The darkest suspicions as to the results to humanity ofthe plots to be engendered in this famous conference between therepresentatives of France and Spain were universally entertained. Thesesuspicions were most reasonable, but they were nevertheless mistaken. Theplan for a concerted action to exterminate the heretics in both kingdomshad, as it was perfectly well known, been formed long before this epoch. It was also no secret that the Queen Regent of France had been desirousof meeting her son-in-law in order to confer with him upon importantmatters, face to face. Philip, however, had latterly been disinclined forthe personal interview with Catharine. As his wife was most anxious tomeet her mother, it was nevertheless finally arranged that Queen Isabellashould make the journey; but he excused himself, on account of themultiplicity of his affairs, from accompanying her in the expedition. TheDuke of Alva was, accordingly, appointed to attend the Queen to Bayonne. Both were secretly instructed by Philip to leave nothing undone in theapproaching interview toward obtaining the hearty co-operation ofCatharine de Medici in a general and formally-arranged scheme for thesimultaneous extermination of all heretics in the French and Spanishdominions. Alva's conduct in this diplomatic commission was stealthy inthe extreme. His letters reveal a subtlety of contrivance and delicacy ofhandling such as the world has not generally reckoned among hischaracteristics. All his adroitness, as well as the tact of QueenIsabella, by whose ability Alva declared himself to have been astounded, proved quite powerless before the steady fencing of the wily Catharine. The Queen Regent, whose skill the Duke, even while defeated, acknowledgedto his master, continued firm in her design to maintain her own power byholding the balance between Guise and Montmorency, between Leaguer andHuguenot. So long as her enemies could be employed in exterminating eachother, she was willing to defer the extermination of the Huguenots. Thegreat massacre of St. Bartholomew was to sleep for seven years longer. Alva was, to be sure, much encouraged at first by the language of theFrench princes and nobles who were present at Bayonne. Monluc protestedthat "they might saw the Queen Dowager in two before she would becomeHuguenot. " Montpensier exclaimed that "he would be cut in pieces forPhilip's service--that the Spanish monarch was the only hope for France, "and, embracing Alva with fervor, he affirmed that "if his body were to beopened at that moment, the name of Philip would be found imprinted uponhis heart. " The Duke, having no power to proceed to an autopsy, physicalor moral, of Montpensier's interior, was left somewhat in the dark, notwithstanding these ejaculations. His first conversation with theyouthful King, however, soon dispelled his hopes. He found immediately, in his own words, that Charles the Ninth "had been doctored. " To take uparms, for religious reasons, against his own subjects, the monarchdeclared to be ruinous and improper. It was obvious to Alva that theroyal pupil had learned his lesson for that occasion. It was a pity forhumanity that the wisdom thus hypocritically taught him could not havesunk into his heart. The Duke did his best to bring forward the plans andwishes of his royal master, but without success. The Queen Regentproposed a league of the two Kings and the Emperor against the Turk, andwished to arrange various matrimonial alliances between the sons anddaughters of the three houses. Alva expressed the opinion that thealliances were already close enough, while, on the contrary, a secretleague against the Protestants would make all three families the safer. Catherine, however, was not to be turned from her position. She refusedeven to admit that the Chancellor de l'Hospital was a Huguenot, to whichthe Duke replied that she was the only person in her kingdom who heldthat opinion. She expressed an intention of convoking an assembly ofdoctors, and Alva ridiculed in his letters to Philip the affectation ofsuch a proceeding. In short, she made it sufficiently evident that thehour for the united action of the French and Spanish sovereigns againsttheir subjects had not struck, so that the famous Bayonne conference wasterminated without a result. It seemed not the less certain, however, inthe general opinion of mankind, that all the particulars of a regularplot had been definitely arranged upon this occasion, for theextermination of the Protestants, and the error has been propagated byhistorians of great celebrity of all parties, down to our own days. Thesecret letters of Alva, however, leave no doubt as to the facts. 

In the course of November, fresh letters from Philip arrived in theNetherlands, confirming every thing which he had previously written. Hewrote personally to the inquisitors-general, Tiletanus and De Bay, encouraging them, commending them, promising them his support, and urgingthem not to be deterred by any consideration from thoroughly fulfillingtheir duties. He wrote Peter Titelmann a letter, in which he applaudedthe pains taken by that functionary to remedy the ills which religion wassuffering, assured him of his gratitude, exhorted him to continue in hisvirtuous course, and avowed his determination to spare neither pains, expense, nor even his own life, to sustain the Catholic Faith. To theDuchess he wrote at great length, and in most unequivocal language. Hedenied that what he had written from Valladolid was of different meaningfrom the sense of the despatches by Egmont. With regard to certainAnabaptist prisoners, concerning whose fate Margaret had requested hisopinion, he commanded their execution, adding that such was his will inthe case of all, whatever their quality, who could be caught. That whichthe people said in the Netherlands touching the inquisition, hepronounced extremely distasteful to him. That institution, which hadexisted under his predecessors, he declared more necessary than ever; norwould he suffer it to be discredited. He desired his sister to put nofaith in idle talk, as to the inconveniences likely to flow from therigor of the inquisition. Much greater inconveniences would be the resultif the inquisitors did not proceed with their labors, and the Duchess wascommanded to write to the secular judges, enjoining upon them to place noobstacles in the path, but to afford all the assistance which might berequired. 

To Egmont, the King wrote with his own hand, applauding much that wascontained in the recent decisions of the assembly of bishops and doctorsof divinity, and commanding the Count to assist in the execution of theroyal determination. In affairs of religion, Philip expressed the opinionthat dissimulation and weakness were entirely out of place. 

When these decisive letters came before the state council, theconsternation was extreme. The Duchess had counted, in spite of herinmost convictions, upon less peremptory instructions. The Prince ofOrange, the Count of Egmont, and the Admiral, were loud in theirdenunciations of the royal policy. There was a violent and protracteddebate. The excitement spread at once to the people. Inflammatoryhand-bills were circulated. Placards were posted every night upon thedoors of Orange, Egmont, and Horn, calling upon them to come forth boldlyas champions of the people and of liberty in religious matters. Banquetswere held daily at the houses of the nobility, in which the more ardentand youthful of their order, with brains excited by wine and anger, indulged in flaming invectives against the government, and interchangedvows to protect each other and the cause of the oppressed provinces. Meanwhile the privy council, to which body the Duchess had referred therecent despatches from Madrid, made a report upon the whole subject tothe state council, during the month of November, sustaining the royalviews, and insisting upon the necessity of carrying them into effect. Theedicts and inquisition having been so vigorously insisted upon by theKing, nothing was to be done but to issue new proclamations throughoutthe country, together with orders to bishops, councils, governors andjudges, that every care should be taken to enforce them to the full. 

This report came before the state council, and was sustained by some ofits members. The Prince of Orange expressed the same uncompromisinghostility to the inquisition which he had always manifested, but observedthat the commands of the King were so precise and absolute, as to leaveno possibility of discussing that point. There was nothing to be done, hesaid, but to obey, but he washed his hands of the fatal consequenceswhich he foresaw. There was no longer any middle course between obedienceand rebellion. This opinion, the soundness of which could scarcely bedisputed, was also sustained by Egmont and Horn. 

Viglius, on the contrary, nervous, agitated, appalled, was now disposedto temporize. He observed that if the seigniors feared such evil results, it would be better to prevent, rather than to accelerate the danger whichwould follow the proposed notification to the governors and municipalauthorities throughout the country, on the subject of the inquisition. Tomake haste, was neither to fulfil the intentions nor to serve theinterests of the King, and it was desirable "to avoid emotion andscandal. " Upon these heads the President made a very long speech, avowing, in conclusion, that if his Majesty should not find the courseproposed agreeable, he was ready to receive all the indignation upon hisown head. 

Certainly, this position of the President was somewhat inconsistent withhis previous course. He had been most violent in his denunciations of allwho should interfere with the execution of the great edict of which hehad been the original draughtsman. He had recently been ferocious incombating the opinion of those civilians in the assembly of doctors whohad advocated the abolition of the death penalty against heresy. He hadexpressed with great energy his private opinion that the ancient religionwould perish if the machinery of persecution were taken away; yet he nowfor the first time seemed to hear or to heed the outcry of a wholenation, and to tremble at the sound. Now that the die had been cast, inaccordance with the counsels of his whole life, now that the royalcommands, often enigmatical and hesitating; were at last too distinct tobe misconstrued, and too peremptory to be tampered with--the presidentimagined the possibility of delay. The health of the ancient Frisian hadbut recently permitted him to resume his seat at the council board. Hispresence there was but temporary, for he had received from Madrid theacceptance of his resignation, accompanied with orders to discharge theduties of President until the arrival of his successor, Charles deTisnacq. Thus, in his own language, the Duchess was still obliged to relyfor a season "upon her ancient Palinurus, " a necessity far from agreeableto her, for she had lost confidence in the pilot. It may be supposed thathe was anxious to smooth the troubled waters during the brief period inwhich he was still to be exposed to their fury; but he poured out the oilof his eloquence in vain. Nobody sustained his propositions. The Duchess, although terrified at the probable consequences, felt the impossibilityof disobeying the deliberate decree of her brother. A proclamation wasaccordingly prepared, by which it was ordered that the Council of Trent, the edicts and the inquisition, should be published in every town andvillage in the provinces, immediately, and once in six months foreverafterwards. The deed was done, and the Prince of Orange, stooping to theear of his next neighbor, as they sat at the council-board, whisperedthat they were now about to witness the commencement of the mostextraordinary tragedy which had ever been enacted. 

The prophecy was indeed a proof that the Prince could read the future, but the sarcasm of the President, that the remark had been made in a toneof exultation, was belied by every action of the prophet's life. 

The fiat went forth. In the market-place of every town and village of theNetherlands, the inquisition was again formally proclaimed. Every doubtwhich had hitherto existed as to the intention of the government wasswept away. No argument was thenceforward to be permissible as to theconstitutionality of the edicts as to the compatibility of theirprovisions with the privileges of the land. The cry of a people in itsagony ascended to Heaven. The decree was answered with a howl ofexecration. The flames of popular frenzy arose lurid and threateningabove the house-tops of every town and village. The impending conflictcould no longer be mistaken. The awful tragedy which the great watchmanin the land had so long unceasingly predicted, was seen sweeping solemnlyand steadily onward. The superstitious eyes of the age saw supernaturaland ominous indications in the sky. Contending armies trampled theclouds; blood dropped from heaven; the exterminating angel rode upon thewind. 

There was almost a cessation of the ordinary business of mankind. Commerce was paralyzed. Antwerp shook as with an earthquake. A chasmseemed to open, in which her prosperity and her very existence were to beforever engulfed. The foreign merchants, manufacturers, and artisans fledfrom her gates as if the plague were raging within them. Thriving citieswere likely soon to be depopulated. The metropolitan heart of the wholecountry was almost motionless. 

Men high in authority sympathized with the general indignation. TheMarquis Berghen, the younger Mansfeld, the Baron Montigny, openly refusedto enforce the edicts within their governments. Men of eminence inveighedboldly and bitterly against the tyranny of the government, and counselleddisobedience. The Netherlanders, it was stoutly maintained, were not suchsenseless brutes as to be ignorant of the mutual relation of prince andpeople. They knew that the obligation of a king to his vassals was assacred as the duties of the subjects to the sovereign. 

The four principal cities of Brabant first came forward in formaldenunciation of the outrage. An elaborate and conclusive document wasdrawn up in their name, and presented to the Regent. It set forth thatthe recent proclamation violated many articles in the "joyous entry. "That ancient constitution had circumscribed the power of the clergy, andthe jealousy had been felt in old times as much by the sovereign as thepeople. No ecclesiastical tribunal had therefore been allowed, exceptingthat of the Bishop of Cambray, whose jurisdiction was expressly confinedto three classes of cases--those growing out of marriages, testaments, and mortmains. 

It would be superfluous to discuss the point at the present day, whetherthe directions to the inquisitors and the publication of the edictsconflicted with the "joyous entrance. " To take a man from his house andburn him, after a brief preliminary examination, was clearly not tofollow the letter and spirit of the Brabantine habeas corpus, by whichinviolability of domicile and regular trials were secured and sworn to bythe monarch; yet such had been the uniform practice of inquisitorsthroughout the country. The petition of the four cities was referred bythe Regent to the council of Brabant. The chancellor, or president judgeof that tribunal was notoriously corrupt--a creature of the Spanish. Hisefforts to sustain the policy of the administration however vain. TheDuchess ordered the archives of the province to be searched forprecedents, and the council to report upon the petition. The case was tooplain for argument or dogmatism, but the attempt was made to take refugein obscurity. The answer of the council was hesitating and equivocal. TheDuchess insisted upon a distinct and categorical answer to the fourcities. Thus pressed, the council of Brabant declared roundly that noinquisition of any kind had ever existed, in the provinces. It wasimpossible that any other answer could be given, but Viglius, with hisassociates in the privy council, were extremely angry at the conclusion. The concession was, however, made, notwithstanding the bad example which, according to some persons, the victory thus obtained by so important aprovince would afford to the people in the other parts of the country. Brabant was declared free of the inquisition. Meanwhile the pamphlets, handbills, pasquils, and other popular productions were multiplied. Touse a Flemish expression, they "snowed in the streets. " They were nailednightly on all the great houses in Brussels. Patriots were called upon tostrike, speak, redress. Pungent lampoons, impassioned invectives, andearnest remonstrances, were thrust into the hands of the Duchess. Thepublications, as they appeared; were greedily devoured by the people. "Weare willing, " it was said, in a remarkable letter to the King, "to diefor the Gospel, but we read therein 'Render unto Caesar that which isCaesar's, and unto God that which is God's. ' We thank God that ourenemies themselves are compelled to bear witness to our piety andpatience; so that it is a common saying--'He swears not; he is aProtestant; he is neither a fornicator nor a drunkard; he is of the newsect. ' Yet, notwithstanding these testimonials to our character, nomanner of punishment has been forgotten by which we can possibly beChastised. " This statement of the morality of the Puritans of theNetherlands was the justification of martyrs--not the self-glorificationof Pharisees. The fact was incontrovertible. Their tenets were rigid, buttheir lives were pure. They belonged generally to the middling and lowerclasses. They were industrious artisans, who desired to live in the fearof God and in honor of their King. They were protected by nobles andgentlemen of high position, very many of whom came afterwards warmly toespouse the creed which at first they had only generously defended. Theirwhole character and position resembled, in many features, those of theEnglish Puritans, who, three quarters of a century afterwards, fled forrefuge to the Dutch Republic, and thence departed to establish theAmerican Republic. The difference was that the Netherlanders were exposedto a longer persecution and a far more intense martyrdom. 

Towards the end of the year (1565) which was closing in such universalgloom; the contemporary chronicles are enlivened with a fitful gleam ofsunshine. The light enlivens only the more elevated regions of theFlemish world, but it is pathetic to catch a glimpse of those nobles, many of whose lives were to be so heroic, and whose destinies so tragic, as amid the shadows projected by coming evil, they still found time forthe chivalrous festivals of their land and epoch. A splendid tournamentwas held at the Chateau d'Antoing to celebrate the nuptials of BaronMontigny with the daughter of Prince d'Espinoy. Orange, Horn, andHoogstraaten were the challengers, and maintained themselves victoriouslyagainst all comers, Egmont and other distinguished knights being, amongthe number. 

Thus brilliantly and gaily moved the first hours of that marriage whichbefore six months had fled was to be so darkly terminated. The doom whichawaited the chivalrous bridegroom in the dungeon of Simancas was ere longto be recorded in one of the foulest chapters of Philip's tyranny. 

A still more elaborate marriage-festival, of which the hero was, at alater day, to exercise a most decisive influence over the fortunes of theland, was celebrated at Brussels before the close of the year. It will beremembered that Alexander, Prince of Parma, had accompanied Egmont on hisreturn from Spain in the month of April. The Duchess had been delightedwith the appearance of her son, then twenty years of age, but already anaccomplished cavalier. She had expressed her especial pleasure in findinghim so thoroughly a Spaniard "in manner, costume, and conversation, " thatit could not be supposed he had ever visited any other land, or spokenany other tongue than that of Spain. 

The nobles of the Flemish court did not participate in the mother'senthusiasm. It could not be denied that he was a handsome and gallantyoung prince; but his arrogance was so intolerable as to disgust eventhose most disposed to pay homage to Margaret's son. He kept himselfmainly in haughty retirement, dined habitually alone in his ownapartments, and scarcely honored any of the gentlemen of the Netherlandswith his notice. Even Egmont, to whose care he had been especiallyrecommended by Philip, was slighted. If, occasionally, he honored one ortwo of the seigniors with an invitation to his table, he sat alone insolemn state at the head of the board, while the guests, to whom hescarcely vouchsafed a syllable, were placed on stools without backs, below the salt. Such insolence, it may be supposed, was sufficientlygalling to men of the proud character, but somewhat reckless demeanor, which distinguished the Netherland aristocracy. After a short time theyheld themselves aloof, thinking it sufficient to endure such airs fromPhilip. The Duchess at first encouraged the young Prince in hishaughtiness, but soon became sad, as she witnessed its effects. It wasthe universal opinion that the young Prince was a mere compound of prideand emptiness. "There is nothing at all in the man, " said Chantonnay. Certainly the expression was not a fortunate one. Time was to show thatthere was more in the man than in all the governors despatchedsuccessively by Philip to the Netherlands; but the proof was to bedeferred to a later epoch. Meantime, his mother was occupied andexceedingly perplexed with his approaching nuptials. He had beenaffianced early in the year to the Princess Donna Maria of Portugal. Itwas found necessary, therefore, to send a fleet of several vessels toLisbon, to fetch the bride to the Netherlands, the wedding beingappointed to take place in Brussels. This expense alone was considerable, and the preparations for banquets, jousts, and other festivities, werelikewise undertaken on so magnificent a scale that the Duke, her husband, was offended at Margaret's extravagance. The people, by whom she was notbeloved, commented bitterly on the prodigalities which they werewitnessing in a period of dearth and trouble. Many of the nobles mockedat her perplexity. To crown the whole, the young Prince was so obligingas to express the hope, in his mother's hearing, that the bridal fleet, then on its way from Portugal, might sink with all it contained, to thebottom of the sea. 

The poor Duchess was infinitely chagrined by all these circumstances. The"insane and outrageous expenses" in which the nuptials had involved her, the rebukes of her husband, the sneers of the seigniors, the undutifulepigrams of her son, the ridicule of the people, affected her spirits tosuch a degree, harassed as she was with grave matters of state, that shekept her rooms for days together, weeping, hour after hour, in the mostpiteous manner. Her distress was the town talk; nevertheless, the fleetarrived in the autumn, and brought the youthful Maria to the provinces. This young lady, if the faithful historiographer of the Farnese house isto be credited, was the paragon of princesses. 

 [This princess, in her teens, might already exclaim, with the venerable Faustus:

 "Habe nun Philosophie Juristerei and Medicin Und leider ach: Theologie Durch studirt mit heissem Bemuhen, " etc. 

 The panegyrists of royal houses in the sixteenth century were not accustomed to do their work by halves. --Strada. ]

She was the daughter of Prince Edward, and granddaughter of John theThird. She was young and beautiful; she could talk both Latin and Greek, besides being well versed in philosophy, mathematics and theology. Shehad the scriptures at her tongue's end, both the old dispensation and thenew, and could quote from the fathers with the promptness of a bishop. She was so strictly orthodox that, on being compelled by stress ofweather to land in England, she declined all communication with QueenElizabeth, on account of her heresy. She was so eminently chaste that shecould neither read the sonnets of Petrarch, nor lean on the arm of agentleman. Her delicacy upon such points was, indeed, carried to suchexcess, that upon one occasion when the ship which was bringing her tothe Netherlands was discovered to be burning, she rebuked a rude fellowwho came forward to save her life, assuring him that there was lesscontamination in the touch of fire than in that of man. Fortunately, theflames were extinguished, and the Phoenix of Portugal was permitted todescend, unburned, upon the bleak shores of Flanders. 

The occasion, notwithstanding the recent tears of the Duchess, and thearrogance of the Prince, was the signal for much festivity among thecourtiers of Brussels. It was also the epoch from which movements of asecret and important character were to be dated. The chevaliers of theFleece were assembled, and Viglius pronounced before them one of his mostclassical orations. He had a good deal to say concerning the privateadventures of Saint Andrew, patron of the Order, and went into somedetails of a conversation which that venerated personage had once heldwith the proconsul Aegeas. The moral which he deduced from his narrativewas the necessity of union among the magnates for the maintenance of theCatholic faith; the nobility and the Church being the two columns uponwhich the whole social fabric reposed. It is to be feared that thePresident became rather prosy upon the occasion. Perhaps his homily, likethose of the fictitious Archbishop of Granada, began to smack of theapoplexy from which he had so recently escaped. Perhaps, the meetingbeing one of hilarity, the younger nobles became restive under theinfliction of a very long and very solemn harangue. At any rate, as themeeting broke up, there was a good dial of jesting on the subject. DeHammes, commonly called "Toison d'Or, " councillor and king-at-arms of theOrder, said that the President had been seeing visions and talking withSaint Andrew in a dream. Marquis Berghen asked for the source whence hehad derived such intimate acquaintance with the ideas of the Saint. ThePresident took these remarks rather testily, and, from trifling, thecompany became soon earnestly engaged in a warm discussion of theagitating topics of the day. It soon became evident to Viglius that DeHammer and others of his comrades had been dealing with dangerous things. He began shrewdly to suspect that the popular heresy was rapidlyextending into higher regions; but it was not the President alone whodiscovered how widely the contamination was spreading. The meeting, theaccidental small talk, which had passed so swiftly from gaiety togravity, the rapid exchange of ideas, and the free-masonry by whichintelligence upon forbidden topics had been mutually conveyed, becameevents of historical importance. Interviews between nobles, who, in thecourse of the festivities produced by the Montigny and Parma marriages, had discovered that they entertained a secret similarity of sentimentupon vital questions, became of frequent occurrence. The result to whichsuch conferences led will be narrated in the following chapter. 

Meantime, upon the 11th November, 1565, the marriage of Prince Alexanderand Donna Maria was celebrated; with great solemnity, by the Archbishopof Cambray, in the chapel of the court at Brussels. On the followingSunday the wedding banquet was held in the great hall, where, ten yearspreviously, the memorable abdication of the bridegroom's imperialgrandfather had taken place. 

The walls were again hung with the magnificent tapestry of Gideon, whilethe Knights of the Fleece, with all the other grandees of the land, wereassembled to grace the spectacle. The King was represented by his envoyin England, Don Guzman de Silva, who came to Brussels for the occasion, and who had been selected for this duty because, according to Armenteros, "he was endowed, beside his prudence, with so much witty gracefulnesswith ladies in matters of pastime and entertainment. " Early in the monthof December, a famous tournament was held in the great market-place ofBrussels, the Duke of Parma, the Duke of Aerschot, and Count Egmont beingjudges of the jousts. Count Mansfeld was the challenger, assisted by hisson Charles, celebrated among the gentry of the land for his dexterity insuch sports. To Count Charles was awarded upon this occasion the silvercup from the lady of the lists. Count Bossu received the prize forbreaking best his lances; the Seigneur de Beauvoir for the most splendidentrance; Count Louis, of Nassau, for having borne himself most gallantlyin the melee. On the same evening the nobles, together with the bridalpair, were entertained at a splendid supper, given by the city ofBrussels in the magnificent Hotel de Ville. On this occasion the prizesgained at the tournament were distributed, amid the applause and hilarityof all the revellers. 

Thus, with banquet, tourney, and merry marriage bells, with gaietygilding the surface of society, while a deadly hatred to the inquisitionwas eating into the heart of the nation, and while the fires of civil warwere already kindling, of which no living man was destined to witness theextinction, ended the year 1565. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 All offices were sold to the highest bidder English Puritans Habeas corpus He did his best to be friends with all the world Look through the cloud of dissimulation No law but the law of the longest purse Panegyrists of royal houses in the sixteenth century Secret drowning was substituted for public burning Sonnets of Petrarch St. Bartholomew was to sleep for seven years longer To think it capable of error, is the most devilish heresy of all

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION, VOLUME 10. 

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D. C. L. , LL. D. 

1855

CHAPTER VI. 1566

 Francis Junius--His sermon at Culemburg House--The Compromise-- Portraits of Sainte Aldegonde, of Louis 'Nassau, of "Toison d'Or, " of Charles Mansfeld--Sketch of the Compromise--Attitude of Orange-- His letter to the Duchess--Signers of the Compromise--Indiscretion of the confederates--Espionage over Philip by Orange-- Dissatisfaction of the seigniors--Conduct of Egmont--Despair of the people--Emigration to England--Its effects--The request--Meeting at Breda and Hoogstraaten--Exaggerated statements concerning the Request in the state council--Hesitation of the Duchess--Assembly of notables--Debate concerning the Request and the inquisition-- Character of Brederode--Arrival of the petitioners in Brussels-- Presentation of the Request--Emotion of Margaret--Speech of Brederode--Sketch of the Request--Memorable sarcasm of Berlaymont-- Deliberation in the state council--Apostille to the Request--Answer to the Apostille--Reply of the Duchess--Speech of D'Esquerdes-- Response of Margaret--Memorable banquet at Culemburg House--Name of "the beggars" adopted--Orange, Egmont, and Horn break up the riotous meeting--Costume of "the beggars"--Brederode at Antwerp--Horrible execution at Oudenardo--Similar cruelties throughout the provinces-- Project of "Moderation"--Religious views of Orange--His resignation of all his offices not accepted--The "Moderation" characterized-- Egmont at Arras Debate on the "Moderation"--Vacillation of Egmont-- Mission of Montigny and Berghen to Spain--Instructions to the envoys--Secret correspondence of Philip with the Pope concerning the Netherland inquisition and the edicts--Field-preaching in the provinces--Modet at Ghent--Other preachers characterized--Excitement at Tournay--Peter Gabriel at Harlem--Field--preaching near Antwerp-- Embarrassment of the Regent--Excitement at Antwerp--Pensionary Wesenbeck sent to Brussels--Orange at Antwerp--His patriotic course --Misrepresentation of the Duchess--Intemperate zeal of Dr. Rythovius--Meeting at St. Trond--Conference at Duffel--Louis of Nassau deputed to the Regent--Unsatisfactory negotiations. 

The most remarkable occurrence in the earlier part of the year 1556 wasthe famous Compromise. This document, by which the signers pledgedthemselves to oppose the inquisition, and to defend each other againstall consequences of such a resistance, was probably the work of Philip deMarnix, Lord of Sainte Aldegonde. Much obscurity, however, rests upon theorigin of this league. Its foundations had already been laid in thelatter part of the preceding year. The nuptials of Parma with thePortuguese princess had been the cause of much festivity, not only inBrussels, but at Antwerp. The great commercial metropolis had celebratedthe occasion by a magnificent banquet. There had been triumphal arches, wreaths of flowers, loyal speeches, generous sentiments, in the usualprofusion. The chief ornament of the dinner-table had been a magnificentpiece of confectionary, netting elaborately forth the mission of CountMansfeld with the fleet to Portugal to fetch the bride from her home, with exquisitely finished figures in sugar--portraits, it is to bepresumed--of the principal personages as they appeared during the moststriking scenes of the history. At the very moment, however, of thesedelectations, a meeting was held at Brussels of men whose minds wereoccupied with sterner stuff than sugar-work. On the wedding-day of Parma, Francis Junius, a dissenting minister then residing at Antwerp, wasinvited to Brussels to preach a sermon in the house of Count Culemburg, on the horse-market (now called Little Sablon), before a small assemblyof some twenty gentlemen. 

This Francis Junius, born of a noble family in Bourges, was the pastor ofthe secret French congregation of Huguenots at Antwerp. He was veryyoung, having arrived from Geneva, where he had been educated, to takecharge of the secret church, when but just turned of twenty years. Hewas, however, already celebrated for his learning, his eloquence, and hiscourage. Towards the end of 1565, it had already become known that Juniuswas in secret understanding with Louis of Nassau, to prepare an addressto government on the subject of the inquisition and edicts. Orders weregiven for his arrest. 

A certain painter of Brussels affected conversion to the new religion, that he might gain admission to the congregation, and afterwards earn thereward of the informer. He played his part so well that he was permittedto attend many meetings, in the course of which he sketched the portraitof the preacher, and delivered it to the Duchess Regent, together withminute statements as to his residence and daily habits. Nevertheless, with all this assistance, the government could not succeed in layinghands on him. He escaped to Breda, and continued his labors in spite ofpersecution. The man's courage may be estimated from the fact that hepreached on one occasion a sermon, advocating the doctrines of thereformed Church with his usual eloquence, in a room overlooking themarket-place, where, at the very, instant, the execution by fire ofseveral heretics was taking place, while the light from the flames inwhich the brethren of their Faith were burning, was flickering throughthe glass windows of the conventicle. Such was the man who preached asermon in Culemburg Palace on Parma's wedding-day. The nobles wholistened to him were occupied with grave discourse after conclusion ofthe religious exercises. Junius took no part in their conversation, butin his presence it was resolved that a league against the "barbarous andviolent inquisition" should be formed, and, that the confederates shouldmutually bind themselves both within and without the Netherlands to thisgreat purpose. Junius, in giving this explicit statement; has notmentioned the names of the nobles before whom he preached. It may beinferred that some of them were the more ardent and the more respectableamong the somewhat miscellaneous band by whom the Compromise wasafterwards signed. 

At about the same epoch, Louis of Nassau, Nicolas de Hammes, and certainother gentlemen met at the baths of Spa. At this secret assembly, thefoundations of the Compromise were definitely laid. A document wasafterwards drawn up, which was circulated for signatures in the earlypart of 1566. It is, therefore, a mistake to suppose that this memorablepaper was simultaneously signed and sworn to at any solemn scene likethat of the declaration of American Independence, or like some of thesubsequent transactions in the Netherland revolt, arranged purposely fordramatic effect. Several copies of the Compromise were passed secretlyfrom hand to hand, and in the course of two months some two thousandsignatures had been obtained. The original copy bore but three names, those of Brederode, Charles de Mansfeld, and Louis of Nassau. Thecomposition of the paper is usually ascribed to Sainte Aldegonde, although the fact is not indisputable. At any rate, it is very certainthat he was one of the originators and main supporters of the famousleague. Sainte Aldegonde was one of the most accomplished men of his age. He was of ancient nobility, as he proved by an abundance of historicaland heraldic evidence, in answer to a scurrilous pamphlet in which he hadbeen accused, among other delinquencies, of having sprung from plebeianblood. Having established his "extraction from true and ancient gentlemenof Savoy, paternally and maternally, " he rebuked his assailants in manlystrain. "Even had it been that I was without nobility of birth, " said he, "I should be none the less or more a virtuous or honest man; nor can anyone reproach me with having failed in the point of honor or duty. Whatgreater folly than to boast of the virtue or gallantry of others, as domany nobles who, having neither a grain of virtue in their souls nor adrop of wisdom in their brains, are entirely useless to their country!Yet there are such men, who, because their ancestors have done somevalorous deed, think themselves fit to direct the machinery of a wholecountry, having from their youth learned nothing but to dance and to spinlike weathercocks with their heads as well as their heels. " CertainlySainte Aldegonde had learned other lessons than these. He was one of themany-sided men who recalled the symmetry of antique patriots. He was apoet of much vigor and imagination; a prose writer whose style wassurpassed by that of none of his contemporaries, a diplomatist in whosetact and delicacy William of Orange afterwards reposed in the mostdifficult and important negotiations, an orator whose discourses on manygreat public occasions attracted the attention of Europe, a soldier whosebravery was to be attested afterwards on many a well-fought field, atheologian so skilful in the polemics of divinity, that, as it willhereafter appear, he was more than a match for a bench of bishops upontheir own ground, and a scholar so accomplished, that, besides speakingand writing the classical and several modern languages with facility, hehad also translated for popular use the Psalms of David into vernacularverse, and at a very late period of his life was requested by thestates-general of the republic to translate all the Scriptures, a work, the fulfilment of which was prevented by his death. A passionate foe tothe inquisition and to all the abuses of the ancient Church, an ardentdefender of civil liberty, it must be admitted that he partook also ofthe tyrannical spirit of Calvinism. He never rose to the lofty heights towhich the spirit of the great founder of the commonwealth was destined tosoar, but denounced the great principle of religious liberty for allconsciences as godless. He was now twenty-eight years of age, having beenborn in the same year with his friend Louis of Nassau. His device, "Reposailleurs, " finely typified the restless, agitated and laborious life towhich he was destined. 

That other distinguished leader of the newly-formed league, Count Louis, was a true knight of the olden time, the very mirror of chivalry. Gentle, generous, pious; making use, in his tent before the battle, of theprayers which his mother sent him from the home of his childhood, --yetfiery in the field as an ancient crusader--doing the work of general andsoldier with desperate valor and against any numbers--cheerful andsteadfast under all reverses, witty and jocund in social intercourse, animating with his unceasing spirits the graver and more foreboding soulof his brother; he was the man to whom the eyes of the most ardent amongthe Netherland Reformers were turned at this early epoch, the trustystaff upon which the great Prince of Orange was to lean till it wasbroken. As gay as Brederode, he was unstained by his vices, and exerciseda boundless influence over that reckless personage, who often protestedthat he would "die a poor soldier at his feet. " The career of Louis wasdestined to be short, if reckoned by years, but if by events, it was toattain almost a patriarchal length. At the age of nineteen he had takenpart in the battle of St. Quentin, and when once the war of freedomopened, his sword was never to be sheathed. His days were filled withlife, and when he fell into his bloody but unknown grave, he was to leavea name as distinguished for heroic valor and untiring energy as forspotless integrity. He was small of stature, but well formed; athletic inall knightly exercises, with agreeable features, a dark laughing eye, close-clipped brown hair, and a peaked beard. 

"Golden Fleece, " as Nicholas de Hammes was universally denominated, wasthe illegitimate scion of a noble house. He was one of the most active ofthe early adherents to the league, kept the lists of signers in hispossession, and scoured the country daily to procure new confederates. Atthe public preachings of the reformed religion, which soon after thisepoch broke forth throughout the Netherlands as by a common impulse, hemade himself conspicuous. He was accused of wearing, on such occasions, the ensigns of the Fleece about his neck, in order to induce ignorantpeople to believe that they might themselves legally follow, when theyperceived a member of that illustrious fraternity to be leading the way. As De Hammer was only an official or servant of that Order, but not acompanion, the seduction of the lieges by such false pretenses wasreckoned among the most heinous of his offences. He was fierce in hishostility to the government, and one of those fiery spirits whosepremature zeal was prejudicial to the cause of liberty, and dishearteningto the cautious patriotism of Orange. He was for smiting at once thegigantic atrocity of the Spanish dominion, without waiting for theforging of the weapons by which the blows were to be dealt. He forgotthat men and money were as necessary as wrath, in a contest with the mosttremendous despotism of the world. "They wish, " he wrote to Count Louis, "that we should meet these hungry wolves with remonstrances, using gentlewords, while they are burning and cutting off heads. --Be it so then. Letus take the pen let them take the sword. For them deeds, for us words. Weshall weep, they will laugh. The Lord be praised for all; but I can notwrite this without tears. " This nervous language painted the situationand the character of the writer. 

As for Charles Mansfeld, he soon fell away from the league which he hadembraced originally with excessive ardor. 

By the influence of the leaders many signatures were obtained during thefirst two months of the year. The language of the document was such thatpatriotic Catholics could sign it as honestly as Protestants. Itinveighed bitterly against the tyranny of "a heap of strangers, " who, influenced only by private avarice and ambition, were making use of anaffected zeal for the Catholic religion, to persuade the King into aviolation of his oaths. It denounced the refusal to mitigate the severityof the edicts. It declared the inquisition, which it seemed the intentionof government to fix permanently upon them, as "iniquitous, contrary toall laws, human and divine, surpassing the greatest barbarism which wasever practised by tyrants, and as redounding to the dishonor of God andto the total desolation of the country. " The signers protested, therefore, that "having a due regard to their duties as faithful vassalsof his Majesty, and especially, as noblemen--and in order not to bedeprived of their estates and their lives by those who, under pretext ofreligion, wished to enrich themselves by plunder and murder, " they hadbound themselves to each other by holy covenant and solemn oath to resistthe inquisition. They mutually promised to oppose it in every shape, openor covert, under whatever mask, it might assume, whether bearing the nameof inquisition, placard, or edict, "and to extirpate and eradicate thething in any form, as the mother of all iniquity and disorder. " Theyprotested before God and man, that they would attempt nothing to thedishonor of the Lord or to the diminution of the King's grandeur, majesty, or dominion. They declared, on the contrary, an honest purposeto "maintain the monarch in his estate, and to suppress all seditious, tumults, monopolies, and factions. " They engaged to preserve theirconfederation, thus formed, forever inviolable, and to permit none of itsmembers to be persecuted in any manner, in body or goods, by anyproceeding founded on the inquisition, the edicts, or the present league. 

It will be seen therefore, that the Compromise was in its origin, acovenant of nobles. It was directed against the foreign influence bywhich the Netherlands were exclusively governed, and against theinquisition, whether papal, episcopal, or by edict. There is no doubtthat the country was controlled entirely by Spanish masters, and that theintention was to reduce the ancient liberty of the Netherlands intosubjection to a junta of foreigners sitting at Madrid. Nothing morelegitimate could be imagined than a constitutional resistance to such apolicy. 

The Prince of Orange had not been consulted as to the formation of theleague. It was sufficiently obvious to its founders that his cautiousmind would find much to censure in the movement. His sentiments withregard to the inquisition and the edicts were certainly known to all men. In the beginning of this year, too, he had addressed a remarkable letterto the Duchess, in answer to her written commands to cause the Council ofTrent, the inquisition, and the edicts, in accordance with the recentcommands of the King, to be published and enforced throughout hisgovernment. Although his advice on the subject had not been asked, heexpressed his sense of obligation to speak his mind on the subject, preferring the hazard of being censured for his remonstrance, to that ofincurring the suspicion of connivance at the desolation of the land byhis silence. He left the question of reformation in ecclesiastical moralsuntouched, as not belonging to his vocation: As to the inquisition, hemost distinctly informed her highness that the hope which still lingeredin the popular mind of escaping the permanent establishment of thatinstitution, had alone prevented the utter depopulation of the country, with entire subversion of its commercial and manufacturing industry. Withregard to the edicts, he temperately but forcibly expressed the opinionthat it was very hard to enforce those placards now in their rigor, whenthe people were exasperated, and the misery universal, inasmuch as theyhad frequently been modified on former occasions. The King, he said, could gain nothing but difficulty for himself, and would be sure to losethe affection of his subjects by renewing the edicts, strengthening theinquisition, and proceeding to fresh executions, at a time when thepeople, moved by the example of their neighbors, were naturally inclinedto novelty. Moreover, when by reason of the daily increasing prices ofgrain a famine was impending over the land, no worse moment could bechosen to enforce such a policy. In conclusion, he observed that he wasat all times desirous to obey the commands of his Majesty and herHighness, and to discharge the duties of "a good Christian. " The use ofthe latter term is remarkable, as marking an epoch in the history of thePrince's mind. A year before he would have said a good Catholic, but itwas during this year that his mind began to be thoroughly pervaded byreligious doubt, and that the great question of the Reformation forceditself, not only as a political, but as a moral problem upon him, whichhe felt that he could not much longer neglect instead of solving. 

Such were the opinions of Orange. He could not, however, safely entrustthe sacred interests of a commonwealth to such hands as those ofBrederode--however deeply that enthusiastic personage might drink thehealth of "Younker William, " as he affectionately denominated thePrince--or to "Golden Fleece, " or to Charles Mansfeld, or to that youngerwild boar of Ardennes, Robert de la Marck. In his brother and in SainteAldegonde he had confidence, but he did not exercise over them thatcontrol which he afterwards acquired. His conduct towards the confederacywas imitated in the main by the other great nobles. The covenanters neverexpected to obtain the signatures of such men as Orange, Egmont, Horn, Meghen, Berghen, or Montigny, nor were those eminent personages everaccused of having signed the Compromise, although some of them wereafterwards charged with having protected those who did affix their namesto the document. The confederates were originally found among the lessernobles. Of these some were sincere Catholics, who loved the ancientChurch but hated the inquisition; some were fierce Calvinists ordetermined Lutherans; some were troublous and adventurous spirits, men ofbroken fortunes, extravagant habits, and boundless desires, who no doubtthought that the broad lands of the Church, with their stately abbeys;would furnish much more fitting homes and revenues for gallant gentlementhan for lazy monks. All were young, few had any prudence or conduct, andthe history of the league more than justified the disapprobation ofOrange. The nobles thus banded together, achieved little by theirconfederacy. They disgraced a great cause by their orgies, almost ruinedit by their inefficiency, and when the rope of sand which they hadtwisted fell asunder, the people had gained nothing and the gentry hadalmost lost the confidence of the nation. These remarks apply to the massof the confederates and to some of the leaders. Louis of Nassau andSainte Aldegonde were ever honored and trusted as they deserved. 

Although the language of the Compromise spoke of the leaguers as nobles, yet the document was circulated among burghers and merchants also, manyof whom, according to the satirical remark of a Netherland Catholic, may, have been influenced by the desire of writing their names in sucharistocratic company, and some of whom were destined to expiate suchvainglory upon the scaffold. 

With such associates, therefore, the profound and anxious mind of Orangecould have little in common. Confidence expanding as the numbersincreased, their audacity and turbulence grew with the growth of theleague. The language at their wild banquets was as hot as the wine whichconfused their heads; yet the Prince knew that there was rarely afestival in which there did not sit some calm, temperate Spaniard, watching with quiet eye and cool brain the extravagant demeanor, andlistening with composure to the dangerous avowals or bravados of theserevellers, with the purpose of transmitting a record of their language ordemonstrations, to the inmost sanctuary of Philip's cabinet at Madrid. The Prince knew, too, that the King was very sincere in his determinationto maintain the inquisition, however dilatory his proceedings mightappear. He was well aware that an armed force might be expected ere longto support the royal edicts. Already the Prince had organized that systemof espionage upon Philip, by which the champion of his country was solong able to circumvent its despot. The King left letters carefullylocked in his desk at night, and unseen hands had forwarded copies ofthem to William of Orange before the morning. He left memoranda in hispockets on retiring to bed, and exact transcripts of those papers foundtheir way, likewise, ere he rose, to the same watchman in theNetherlands. No doubt that an inclination for political intrigue was aprominent characteristic of the Prince, and a blemish upon the purity ofhis moral nature. Yet the dissimulating policy of his age he had masteredonly that he might accomplish the noblest purposes to which a great andgood man can devote his life-the protection of the liberty and thereligion of a whole people against foreign tyranny. His intrigue servedhis country, not a narrow personal ambition, and it was only by such artsthat he became Philip's master, instead of falling at once, like so manygreat personages, a blind and infatuated victim. No doubt his purveyorsof secret information were often destined fearfully to atone for theircontraband commerce, but they who trade in treason must expect to pay thepenalty of their traffic. 

Although, therefore, the great nobles held themselves aloof from theconfederacy, yet many of them gave unequivocal signs of their dissentfrom the policy adopted by government. Marquis Berghen wrote to theDuchess; resigning his posts, on the ground of his inability to executethe intention of the King in the matter of religion. Meghen replied tothe same summons by a similar letter. Egmont assured her that he wouldhave placed his offices in the King's hands in Spain, could he haveforeseen that his Majesty would form such resolutions as had now beenproclaimed. The sentiments of Orange were avowed in the letter to whichwe have already alluded. His opinions were shared by Montigny, Culemburg, and many others. The Duchess was almost reduced to desperation. Thecondition of the country was frightful. The most determined loyalists, such as Berlaymont, Viglius and Hopper, advised her not to mention thename of inquisition in a conference which she was obliged to hold with adeputation from Antwerp. She feared, all feared, to pronounce the hatedword. She wrote despairing letters to Philip, describing the condition ofthe land and her own agony in the gloomiest colors. Since the arrival ofthe royal orders, she said, things had gone from bad to worse. The Kinghad been ill advised. It was useless to tell the people that theinquisition had always existed in the provinces. They maintained that itwas a novelty; that the institution was a more rigorous one than theSpanish Inquisition, which, said Margaret, "was most odious, as the Kingknew. " It was utterly impossible to carry the edicts into execution. Nearly all the governors of provinces had told her plainly that theywould not help to burn fifty or sixty thousand Netherlanders. Thusbitterly did Margaret of Parma bewail the royal decree; not that she hadany sympathy for the victims, but because she felt the increasing dangerto the executioner. One of two things it was now necessary to decideupon, concession or armed compulsion. Meantime, while Philip was slowlyand secretly making his levies, his sister, as well as his people, was onthe rack. Of all the seigniors, not one was placed in so painful aposition as Egmont. His military reputation and his popularity made himtoo important a personage to be slighted, yet he was deeply mortified atthe lamentable mistake which he had committed. He now averred that hewould never take arms against the King, but that he would go where manshould never see him more. 

Such was the condition of the nobles, greater and less. That of thepeople could not well be worse. Famine reigned in the land. Emigration, caused not by over population, but by persecution, was fast weakening thecountry. It was no wonder that not only, foreign merchants should bescared from the great commercial cities by the approaching disorders; butthat every industrious artisan who could find the means of escape shouldseek refuge among strangers, wherever an asylum could be found. Thatasylum was afforded by Protestant England, who received these intelligentand unfortunate wanderers with cordiality, and learned with eagerness thelessons in mechanical skill which they had to teach. Already thirtythousand emigrant Netherlanders were established in Sandwich, Norwich, and other places, assigned to them by Elizabeth. It had always, however, been made a condition of the liberty granted to these foreigners forpractising their handiwork, that each house should employ at least oneEnglish apprentice. "Thus, " said a Walloon historian, splenetically, "bythis regulation, and by means of heavy duties on foreign manufactures, have the English built up their own fabrics and prohibited those of theNetherlands. Thus have they drawn over to their own country our skilfulartisans to practise their industry, not at home but abroad, and our poorpeople are thus losing the means of earning their livelihood. Thus hasclothmaking, silk-making and the art of dyeing declined in this country, and would have been quite extinguished but by our wise countervailingedicts. " The writer, who derived most of his materials and his wisdomfrom the papers of Councillor d'Assonleville, could hardly doubt that thepersecution to which these industrious artisans, whose sufferings heaffected to deplore, had been subjected, must have had something to dowith their expatriation; but he preferred to ascribe it wholly to theprotective system adopted by England. In this he followed the opinion ofhis preceptor. "For a long time, " said Assonleville, "the Netherlandshave been the Indies to England; and as long as she has them, she needsno other. The French try to surprise our fortresses and cities: theEnglish make war upon our wealth and upon the purses of the people. "Whatever the cause, however, the current of trade was already turned. Thecloth-making of England was already gaining preponderance over that ofthe provinces. Vessels now went every week from Sandwich to Antwerp, laden with silk, satin, and cloth, manufactured in England, while as manybut a few years before, had borne the Flemish fabrics of the same naturefrom Antwerp to England. 

It might be supposed by disinterested judges that persecution was at thebottom of this change in commerce. The Prince of Orange estimated that upto this period fifty thousand persons in the provinces had been put todeath in obedience to the edicts. He was a moderate man, and accustomedto weigh his words. As a new impulse had been given to the system ofbutchery--as it was now sufficiently plain that "if the father hadchastised his people with a scourge the son held a whip of scorpions" asthe edicts were to be enforced with renewed vigor--it was natural thatcommerce and manufactures should make their escape out of a doomed landas soon as possible, whatever system of tariffs might be adopted byneighboring nations. 

A new step had been resolved upon early in the month of March by theconfederates. A petition, or "Request, " was drawn up, which was to bepresented to the Duchess Regent in a formal manner by a large number ofgentlemen belonging to the league. This movement was so grave, and likelyto be followed by such formidable results, that it seemed absolutelynecessary for Orange and his friends to take some previous cognizance ofit before it was finally arranged. The Prince had no power, nor was thereany reason why he should have the inclination, to prevent the measure, but he felt it his duty to do what he could to control the vehemence ofthe men who were moving so rashly forward, and to take from theirmanifesto, as much as possible, the character of a menace. 

For this end, a meeting ostensibly for social purposes and "good cheer"was held, in the middle of March, at Breda, and afterwards adjourned toHoogstraaten. To these conferences Orange invited Egmont, Horn, Hoogstraaten, Berghen, Meghen, Montigny, and other great nobles. Brederode, Tholouse, Boxtel, and other members of the league, were alsopresent. The object of the Prince in thus assembling his own immediateassociates, governors of provinces and knights of the Fleece, as well assome of the leading members of the league, was twofold. It had long beenhis opinion that a temperate and loyal movement was still possible, bywhich the impending convulsions might be averted. The line of policywhich he had marked out required the assent of the magnates of the land, and looked towards the convocation of the states-general. It was naturalthat he should indulge in the hope of being seconded by the men who werein the same political and social station with himself. All, althoughCatholics, hated the inquisition. As Viglius pathetically exclaimed, "Saint Paul himself would have been unable to persuade these men thatgood fruit was to be gathered from the inquisition in the cause ofreligion. " Saint Paul could hardly be expected to reappear on earth forsuch a purpose. Meantime the arguments of the learned President hadproved powerless, either to convince the nobles that the institution waslaudable or to obtain from the Duchess a postponement in the publicationof the late decrees. The Prince of Orange, however, was not able to bringhis usual associates to his way of thinking. The violent purposes of theleaguers excited the wrath of the more loyal nobles. Their intentionswere so dangerous, even in the estimation of the Prince himself, that hefelt it his duty to lay the whole subject before the Duchess, although hewas not opposed to the presentation of a modest and moderate Request. Meghen was excessively indignant at the plan of the confederates, whichhe pronounced an insult to the government, a treasonable attempt tooverawe the Duchess, by a "few wretched vagabonds. " He swore that "hewould break every one of their heads, if the King would furnish him witha couple of hundred thousand florins. " Orange quietly rebuked thistruculent language, by assuring him both that such a process would bemore difficult than he thought, and that he would also find many men ofgreat respectability among the vagabonds. 

The meeting separated at Hoogstraaten without any useful result, but itwas now incumbent upon the Prince, in his own judgment, to watch, and ina measure to superintend, the proceedings of the confederates. By hiscare the contemplated Request was much altered, and especially made moregentle in its tone. Meghen separated himself thenceforth entirely fromOrange, and ranged himself exclusively upon the side of Government. Egmont vacillated, as usual, satisfying neither the Prince nor theDuchess. 

Margaret of Parma was seated in her council chamber very soon after theseoccurrences, attended both by Orange and Egmont, when the Count of Meghenentered the apartment. With much precipitation, he begged that allmatters then before the board might be postponed, in order that he mightmake an important announcement. He then stated that he had receivedinformation from a gentleman on whose word he could rely, a veryaffectionate servant of the King, but whose name he had promised not toreveal, that a very extensive conspiracy of heretics and sectaries hadbeen formed, both within and without the Netherlands, that they hadalready a force of thirty-five thousand men, foot and horse, ready foraction, that they were about to make a sudden invasion, and to plunderthe whole country, unless they immediately received a formal concessionof entire liberty of conscience, and that, within six or seven days, fifteen hundred men-at-arms would make their appearance before herHighness. These ridiculous exaggerations of the truth were confirmed byEgmont, who said that he had received similar information from personswhose names he was not at liberty to mention, but from whose statementshe could announce that some great tumult might be expected every day. Headded that there were among the confederates many who wished to changetheir sovereign, and that the chieftains and captains of the conspiracywere all appointed. The same nobleman also laid before the council a copyof the Compromise, the terms of which famous document scarcely justifiedthe extravagant language with which it had been heralded. The Duchess wasastounded at these communications. She had already received, but probablynot yet read, a letter from the Prince of Orange upon the subject, inwhich a moderate and plain statement of the actual facts was laid down, which was now reiterated by the same personage by word of mouth. Anagitated and inconclusive debate followed, in which, however, itsufficiently appeared, as the Duchess informed her brother, that one oftwo things must be done without further delay. The time had arrived forthe government to take up arms, or to make concessions. 

In one of the informal meetings of councillors, now held almost daily, onthe subject of the impending Request, Aremberg, Meghen, and Berlaymontmaintained that the door should be shut in the face of the petitionerswithout taking any further notice of the petition. Berlaymont suggestedalso, that if this course were not found advisable, the next best thingwould be to allow the confederates to enter the palace with theirRequest, and then to cut them to pieces to the very last man, by means oftroops to be immediately ordered from the frontiers. Such sanguinaryprojects were indignantly rebuked by Orange. He maintained that theconfederates were entitled to be treated with respect. Many of them, hesaid, were his friends--some of them his relations--and there was noreason for refusing to gentlemen of their rank, a right which belonged tothe poorest plebeian in the land. Egmont sustained these views of thePrince as earnestly as he had on a previous occasion appeared tocountenance the more violent counsels of Meghen. 

Meantime, as it was obvious that the demonstration on the part of theconfederacy was soon about to be made, the Duchess convened a grandassembly of notables, in which not only all the state and privycouncillors, but all the governors and knights of the Fleece were to takepart. On the 28th of March, this assembly was held, at which the wholesubject of the Request, together with the proposed modifications of theedicts and abolition of the inquisition, was discussed. The Duchess alsorequested the advice of the meeting--whether it would not be best for herto retire to some other city, like Mons, which she had selected as herstronghold in case of extremity. The decision was that it would be ahigh-handed proceeding to refuse the right of petition to a body ofgentlemen, many of them related to the greatest nobles in the land; butit was resolved that they should be required to make their appearancewithout arms. As to the contemplated flight of the Duchess, it was urged, with much reason, that such a step would cast disgrace upon thegovernment, and that it would be a sufficiently precautionary measure tostrengthen the guards at the city gates--not to prevent the entrance ofthe petitioners, but to see that they were unaccompanied by an armedforce. It had been decided that Count Brederode should present thepetition to the Duchess at the head of a deputation of about threehundred gentlemen. The character of the nobleman thus placed foremost onsuch an important occasion has been sufficiently made manifest. He had noqualities whatever but birth and audacity to recommend him as a leaderfor a political party. It was to be seen that other attributes werenecessary to make a man useful in such a position, and the Count'sdeficiencies soon became lamentably conspicuous. He was the linealdescendant and representative of the old Sovereign Counts of Holland. Five hundred years before his birth; his ancestor Sikko, younger brotherof Dirk the Third, had died, leaving two sons, one of whom was the firstBaron of Brederode. A descent of five centuries in unbroken malesuccession from the original sovereigns of Holland, gave him a bettergenealogical claim to the provinces than any which Philip of Spain couldassert through the usurping house of Burgundy. In the approaching tumultshe hoped for an opportunity of again asserting the ancient honors of hisname. He was a sworn foe to Spaniards and to "water of the fountain. " Buta short time previously to this epoch he had written to Louis of Nassau, then lying ill of a fever, in order gravely to remonstrate with him onthe necessity of substituting wine for water on all occasions, and itwill be seen in the sequel that the wine-cup was the great instrument onwhich he relied for effecting the deliverance of the country. Although"neither bachelor nor chancellor, " as he expressed it, he was supposed tobe endowed with ready eloquence and mother wit. Even these gifts, however, if he possessed them, were often found wanting on importantemergencies. Of his courage there was no question, but he was notdestined to the death either of a warrior or a martyr. Headlong, noisy, debauched, but brave, kind-hearted and generous, he was a fittingrepresentative of his ancestors, the hard-fighting, hard-drinking, crusading, free-booting sovereigns of Holland and Friesland, and wouldhimself have been more at home and more useful in the eleventh centurythan in the sixteenth. 

It was about six o'clock in the evening, on the third day of April(1566), that the long-expected cavalcade at last entered Brussels. Animmense concourse of citizens of all ranks thronged around the nobleconfederates as soon as they made their appearance. They were about twohundred in number, all on horseback, with pistols in their holsters, andBrederode, tall, athletic, and martial in his bearing, with handsomefeatures and fair curling locks upon his shoulders, seemed an appropriatechieftain for that band of Batavian chivalry. 

The procession was greeted with frequent demonstrations of applause as itwheeled slowly through the city till it reached the mansion of OrangeNassau. Here Brederode and Count Louis alighted, while the rest of thecompany dispersed to different quarters of the town. 

"They thought that I should not come to Brussels, " said Brederode, as hedismounted. "Very well, here I am; and perhaps I shall depart in adifferent manner. " In the Course of the next day, Counts Culemburg andVan den Berg entered the city with one hundred other cavaliers. 

On the morning of the fifth of April, the confederates were assembled atthe Culemburg mansion, which stood on the square called the Sabon, withina few minutes' walk of the palace. A straight handsome street led fromthe house along the summit of the hill, to the splendid residence of theancient Dukes of Brabant, then the abode of Duchess Margaret. At a littlebefore noon, the gentlemen came forth, marching on foot, two by two, tothe number of three hundred. Nearly all were young, many of them bore themost ancient historical names of their country, every one was arrayed inmagnificent costume. It was regarded as ominous, that the man who led theprocession, Philip de Bailleul, was lame. The line was closed byBrederode and Count Louis, who came last, walking arm in arm. An immensecrowd was collected in the square in front of the palace, to welcome themen who were looked upon as the deliverers of the land from Spanishtyranny, from the Cardinalists, and from the inquisition. They werereceived with deafening huzzas and clappings of hands by the assembledpopulace. As they entered the council chamber, passing through the greathall, where ten years before the Emperor had given away his crowns, theyfound the Emperor's daughter seated in the chair of state, and surroundedby the highest personages of the country. The emotion of the Duchess wasevident, as the procession somewhat abruptly made its appearance; nor washer agitation diminished as she observed among the petitioners manyrelatives and, retainers of the Orange and Egmont houses, and sawfriendly glances of recognition exchanged between them and their chiefs. 

As soon as all had entered the senate room, Brederode advanced, made alow obeisance, and spoke a brief speech. He said that he had come thitherwith his colleagues to present a humble petition to her Highness. Healluded to the reports which had been rife, that they had contemplatedtumult, sedition, foreign conspiracies, and, what was more abominablethan all, a change of sovereign. He denounced such statements ascalumnies, begged the Duchess to name the men who had thus aspersed anhonorable and loyal company, and called upon her to inflict exemplarypunishment upon the slanderers. With these prefatory remarks he presentedthe petition. The famous document was then read aloud. --Its tone wassufficiently loyal, particularly in the preamble, which was filled withprotestations of devotion to both King and Duchess. After thisconventional introduction, however, the petitioners proceeded to state, very plainly, that the recent resolutions of his Majesty, with regard tothe edict and the inquisition, were likely to produce a generalrebellion. They had hoped, they said, that a movement would be made bythe seigniors or by the estates, to remedy the evil by striking at itscause, but they had waited in vain. The danger, on the other hand, wasaugmenting every day, universal sedition was at the gate, and they hadtherefore felt obliged to delay no longer, but come forward the first anddo their duty. They professed to do this with more freedom, because thedanger touched them very nearly. They were the most exposed to thecalamities which usually spring from civil commotions, for their housesand lands situate in the open fields, were exposed to the pillage of allthe world. Moreover there was not one of them, whatever his condition, who was not liable at any moment to be executed under the edicts, at thefalse complaint of the first man who wished to obtain his estate, and whochose to denounce him to the inquisitor, at whose mercy were the livesand property of all. They therefore begged the Duchess Regent to despatchan envoy on their behalf, who should humbly implore his Majesty toabolish the edicts. In the mean time they requested her Highness to ordera general surcease of the inquisition, and of all executions, until theKing's further pleasure was made known, and until new ordinances, made byhis Majesty with advice and consent of the states-general duly assembled, should be established. The petition terminated as it had commenced, withexpressions of extreme respect and devoted loyalty. 

The agitation of Duchess Margaret increased very perceptibly during thereading of the paper. When it was finished, she remained for a fewminutes quite silent, with tears rolling down her cheeks. As soon as shecould overcome her excitement, she uttered a few words to the effect thatshe would advise with her councillors and give the petitioners suchanswer as should be found suitable. The confederates then passed out fromthe council chamber into the grand hall; each individual, as he took hisdeparture, advancing towards the Duchess and making what was called the"caracole, " in token of reverence. There was thus ample time tocontemplate the whole company; and to count the numbers of thedeputation. 

After this ceremony had been concluded, there was much earnest debate in. The council. The Prince of Orange addressed a few words to the Duchess, with the view of calming her irritation. He observed that theconfederates were no seditious rebels, but loyal gentlemen, well born, well connected, and of honorable character. They had been influenced, hesaid, by an honest desire to save their country from impendingdanger--not by avarice or ambition. Egmont shrugged his shoulders, andobserved that it was necessary for him to leave the court for a season, in order to make a visit to the baths of Aix, for an inflammation whichhe had in the leg. It was then that Berlaymont, according to the accountwhich has been sanctioned by nearly every contemporary writer, whetherCatholic or Protestant, uttered the gibe which was destined to becomeimmortal, and to give a popular name to the confederacy. "What, Madam, "he is reported to have cried in a passion, "is it possible that yourHighness can entertain fears of these beggars? (gueux). Is it not obviouswhat manner of men they are? They have not had wisdom enough to managetheir own estates, and are they now to teach the King and your Highnesshow to govern the country? By the living God, if my advice were taken, their petition should have a cudgel for a commentary, and we would makethem go down the steps of the palace a great deal faster than theymounted them. "

The Count of Meghen was equally violent in his language. Aremberg was forordering "their reverences; the confederates, " to, quit Brussels withoutdelay. The conversation, carried on in so violent a key, might notunnaturally have been heard by such of the gentlemen as had not yet leftthe grand hall adjoining the council chamber. The meeting of the councilwas then adjourned for an hour or two, to meet again in the afternoon, for the purpose of deciding deliberately upon the answer to be given tothe Request. Meanwhile, many of the confederates were swaggering aboutthe streets, talking very bravely of the scene which had just occurred, and it is probable, boasting not a little of the effect which theirdemonstration would produce. As they passed by the house of Berlaymont, that nobleman, standing at his window in company with Count Aremberg, issaid to have repeated his jest. "There go our fine beggars again, " saidhe. "Look, I pray you, with what bravado they are passing before us!"

On the 6th of April, Brederode, attended by a large number of hiscompanions, again made his appearance at the palace. He then received thepetition, which was returned to him with an apostille or commentary tothis effect:--Her Highness would despatch an envoy for the purpose ofinducing his Majesty to grant the Request. Every thing worthy of theKing's unaffected (naive) and customary benignity might be expected as tothe result. The Duchess had already, with the assistance of the state andprivy councillors, Fleece knights and governors, commenced a project formoderating the edicts, to be laid before the King. As her authority didnot allow her to suspend the inquisition and placards, she was confidentthat the petitioners would be satisfied with the special applicationabout to be made to the King. Meantime, she would give orders to allinquisitors, that they should proceed "modestly and discreetly" in theiroffice, so that no one would have cause to complain. Her Highness hopedlikewise that the gentlemen on their part would conduct themselves in aloyal and satisfactory manner; thus proving that they had no intention tomake innovations in the ancient religion of the country. 

Upon the next day but one, Monday, 8th of April, Brederode, attended by anumber of the confederates, again made his appearance at the palace, forthe purpose of delivering an answer to the Apostille. In this secondpaper the confederates rendered thanks for the prompt reply which theDuchess had given to their Request, expressed regrets that she did notfeel at liberty to suspend the inquisition, and declared their confidencethat she would at once give such orders to the inquisitors andmagistrates that prosecutions for religious matters should cease, untilthe King's further pleasure should be declared. They professed themselvesdesirous of maintaining whatever regulations should be thereafterestablished by his Majesty, with the advice and consent of thestates-general, for the security of the ancient religion, and promised toconduct themselves generally in such wise that her Highness would haveevery reason to be satisfied with them. They, moreover, requested thatthe Duchess would cause the Petition to be printed in authentic form bythe government printer. 

The admission that the confederates would maintain the ancient religionhad been obtained, as Margaret informed her brother, through thedexterous management of Hoogstraaten, without suspicion on the part ofthe petitioners that the proposition for such a declaration came fromher. 

The Duchess replied by word of mouth to the second address thus made toher by the confederates, that she could not go beyond the Apostille whichshe had put on record. She had already caused letters for the inquisitorsand magistrates to be drawn up. The minutes for those instructions shouldbe laid before the confederates by Count Hoogstraaten and SecretaryBerty. As for the printing of their petition, she was willing to granttheir demand, and would give orders to that effect. 

The gentlemen having received this answer, retired into the great hall. After a few minutes' consultation, however, they returned to the councilchamber, where the Seigneur d'Esquerdes, one of their number, addressed afew parting words, in the name of his associates, to the Regent;concluding with a request that she would declare, the confederates tohave done no act, and made no demonstration, inconsistent with their dutyand with a perfect respect for his Majesty. 

To this demand the Duchess answered somewhat drily that she could not bejudge in such a cause. Time and their future deeds, she observed, couldonly bear witness as to their purposes. As for declarations from her, they must be satisfied with the Apostille which they had alreadyreceived. 

With this response, somewhat more tart than agreeable, the nobles wereobliged to content themselves, and they accordingly took their leave. 

It must be confessed that they had been disposed to slide rathercavalierly over a good deal of ground towards the great object which theyhad in view. Certainly the petitio principii was a main feature of theirlogic. They had, in their second address, expressed perfect confidence asto two very considerable concessions. The Duchess was practically tosuspend the inquisition, although she had declared herself withoutauthority for that purpose, The King, who claimed, de jure and de facto, the whole legislative power, was thenceforth to make laws on religiousmatters by and with the consent of the states-general. Certainly, theseends were very laudable, and if a civil and religious revolution couldhave been effected by a few gentlemen going to court in fine clothes topresent a petition, and by sitting down to a tremendous banquetafterwards, Brederode and his associates were the men to accomplish thetask. Unfortunately, a sea of blood and long years of conflict laybetween the nation and the promised land, which for a moment seemed sonearly within reach. 

Meantime the next important step in Brederode's eyes was a dinner. Heaccordingly invited the confederates to a magnificent repast which he hadordered to be prepared in the Culemburg mansion. Three hundred guests satdown, upon the 8th of April, to this luxurious banquet, which wasdestined to become historical. 

The board glittered with silver and gold. The wine circulated with morethan its usual rapidity among the band of noble Bacchanals, who werenever weary of drinking the healths of Brederode, of Orange, and ofEgmont. It was thought that the occasion imperiously demanded anextraordinary carouse, and the political events of the past three dayslent an additional excitement to the wine. There was an earnestdiscussion as to an appropriate name to be given to their confederacy. Should they call themselves the "Society of Concord, " the restorers oflost liberty, or by what other attractive title should the league bebaptized? Brederode was, however, already prepared to settle thequestion. He knew the value of a popular and original name; he possessedthe instinct by which adroit partisans in every age have been accustomedto convert the reproachful epithets of their opponents into watchwords ofhonor, and he had already made his preparations for a startlingtheatrical effect. Suddenly, amid the din of voices, he arose, with allhis rhetorical powers at command: He recounted to the company theobservations which the Seigneur de Berlaymont was reported to have madeto the Duchess, upon the presentation of the Request, and the name whichhe had thought fit to apply to them collectively. Most of the gentlementhen heard the memorable sarcasm for the first time. Great was theindignation of all that the state councillor should have dared tostigmatize as beggars a band of gentlemen with the best blood of the landin their veins. Brederode, on the contrary, smoothing their anger, assured them with good humor that nothing could be more fortunate. "Theycall us beggars!" said he; "let us accept the name. We will contend withthe inquisition, but remain loyal to the King, even till compelled towear the beggar's sack. "

He then beckoned to one of his pages, who brought him a leathern wallet, such as was worn at that day by professional mendicants, together with alarge wooden bowl, which also formed part of their regular appurtenances. Brederode immediately hung the wallet around his neck, filled the bowlwith wine, lifted it with both hands, and drained it at a draught. "Longlive the beggars!" he cried, as he wiped his beard and set the bowl down. "Vivent les gueulx. " Then for the first time, from the lips of thosereckless nobles rose the famous, cry, which was so often to ring overland and sea, amid blazing cities, on blood-stained decks, through thesmoke and carnage of many a stricken field. The humor of Brederode washailed with deafening shouts of applause. The Count then threw the walletaround the neck of his nearest neighbor, and handed him the wooden bawl. Each guest, in turn, donned the mendicant's knapsack. Pushing aside hisgolden goblet, each filled the beggars' bowl to the brim, and drained itto the beggars' health. Roars of laughter, and shouts of "Vivent lesgueulx" shook the walls of the stately mansion, as they were doomed neverto shake again. The shibboleth was invented. The conjuration which theyhad been anxiously seeking was found. Their enemies had provided themwith a spell, which was to prove, in after days, potent enough to start aspirit from palace or hovel, forest or wave, as the deeds of the "wildbeggars, " the "wood beggars, " and the "beggars of the sea" taught Philipat last to understand the nation which he had driven to madness. 

When the wallet and bowl had made the circuit of the table, they weresuspended to a pillar in the hall. Each of the company in succession thenthrew some salt into his goblet, and, placing himself under these symbolsof the brotherhood, repeated a jingling distich, produced impromptu forthe occasion. 

 By this salt, by this bread, by this wallet we swear, These beggars ne'er will change, though all the world should stare. 

This ridiculous ceremony completed the rites by which the confederacyreceived its name; but the banquet was by no means terminated. The uproarbecame furious. The younger and more reckless nobles abandoned themselvesto revelry, which would have shamed heathen Saturnalia. They renewed toeach other, every moment, their vociferous oaths of fidelity to thecommon cause, drained huge beakers to the beggars' health, turned theircaps and doublets inside out, danced upon chairs and tables. Severaladdressed each other as Lord Abbot, or Reverend Prior, of this or thatreligious institution, thus indicating the means by which some of themhoped to mend their broken fortunes. 

While the tumult was at its height, the Prince of Orange with Counts Hornand Egmont entered the apartment. They had been dining quietly withMansfeld, who was confined to his house with an inflamed eye, and theywere on their way to the council chamber, where the sessions were nowprolonged nightly to a late hour. Knowing that Hoogstraaten, somewhatagainst his will, had been induced to be present at the banquet, they hadcome round by the way of Culemburg House, to induce him to retire. Theywere also disposed, if possible, to abridge the festivities which theirinfluence would have been powerless to prevent. 

These great nobles, as soon as they made their appearance, weresurrounded by a crew of "beggars, " maddened and dripping with theirrecent baptism of wine, who compelled them to drink a cup amid shouts of"Vivent le roi et les gueulx!" The meaning of this cry they of coursecould not understand, for even those who had heard Berlaymont'scontemptuous remarks, might not remember the exact term which he hadused, and certainly could not be aware of the importance to which it hadjust been elevated. As for Horn, he disliked and had long beforequarrelled with Brederode, had prevented many persons from signing theCompromise, and, although a guest at that time of Orange, was in thehabit of retiring to bed before supper, to avoid the company of many whofrequented the house. Yet his presence for a few moments, with the bestintentions, at the conclusion of this famous banquet, was made one of themost deadly charges which were afterwards drawn up against him by theCrown. The three seigniors refused to be seated, and remained but for amoment, "the length of a Miserere, " taking with them Hoogstraaten as theyretired. They also prevailed upon the whole party to break up at the sametime, so that their presence had served at least to put a conclusion tothe disgraceful riot. When they arrived at the council chamber theyreceived the thanks of the Duchess for what they had done. 

Such was the first movement made by the members of the Compromise. Was itstrange that Orange should feel little affinity with such companions? Hadhe not reason to hesitate, if the sacred cause of civil and religiousliberty could only be maintained by these defenders and with suchassistance?

The "beggars" did not content themselves with the name alone of thetime-honored fraternity of Mendicants in which they had enrolledthemselves. Immediately after the Culemburg banquet, a costume for theconfederacy was decided upon. 

These young gentlemen discarding gold lace and velvet, thought itexpedient to array themselves in doublets and hose of ashen grey, withshort cloaks of the same color, all of the coarsest materials. Theyappeared in this guise in the streets, with common felt hats on theirheads, and beggars' pouches and bowls at their sides. They caused alsomedals of lead and copper to be struck, bearing upon one side the head ofPhilip; upon the reverse, two hands clasped within a wallet, with themotto, "Faithful to the King, even to wearing the beggar's sack. " Thesebadges they wore around their necks, or as buttons to their hats. As afurther distinction they shaved their beards close, excepting themoustachios, which were left long and pendent in the Turkishfashion, --that custom, as it seemed, being an additional characteristicof Mendicants. 

Very soon after these events the nobles of the league dispersed from thecapital to their various homes. Brederode rode out of Brussels at thehead of a band of cavaliers, who saluted the concourse of applaudingspectators with a discharge of their pistols. Forty-three gentlemenaccompanied him to Antwerp, where he halted for a night. The Duchess hadalready sent notice to the magistrates of that city of his intendedvisit, and warned them to have an eye upon his proceedings. "The greatbeggar, " as Hoogstraaten called him, conducted himself, however, with asmuch propriety as could be expected. Four or five thousand of theinhabitants thronged about the hotel where he had taken up his quarters. He appeared at a window with his wooden bowl, filled with wine, in hishands, and his wallet at his side. He assured the multitude that he wasready to die to defend the good people of Antwerp and of all theNetherlands against the edicts and the inquisition. Meantime he dranktheir healths, and begged all who accepted the pledge to hold up theirhands. The populace, highly amused, held up and clapped their hands ashonest Brederode drained his bowl, and were soon afterwards persuaded toretire in great good humor. 

These proceedings were all chronicled and transmitted to Madrid. It wasalso both publicly reported and secretly registered, that Brederode hadeaten capons and other meat at Antwerp, upon Good Friday, which happenedto be the day of his visit to that city. He denied the charge, however;with ludicrous vehemence. "They who have told Madame that we ate meat inAntwerp, " he wrote to Count Louis, "have lied wickedly and miserably, twenty-four feet down in their throats. " He added that his nephew, Charles Mansfeld, who, notwithstanding the indignant prohibition of hisfather, had assisted of the presentation of the Request, and was then inhis uncle's company at Antwerp, had ordered a capon, which Brederode hadcountermanded. "They told me afterwards, " said he, "that my nephew hadbroiled a sausage in his chamber. I suppose that he thought himself inSpain, where they allow themselves such dainties. "

Let it not be thought that these trifles are beneath the dignity ofhistory. Matters like these filled the whole soul of Philip, swelled thebills of indictment for thousands of higher and better men thanBrederode, and furnished occupation as well for secret correspondents andspies as for the most dignified functionaries of Government. Capons orsausages on Good Friday, the Psalms of Clement Marot, the Sermon on theMount in the vernacular, led to the rack, the gibbet, and the stake, butushered in a war against the inquisition which was to last for eightyyears. Brederode was not to be the hero of that party which he disgracedby his buffoonery. Had he lived, he might, perhaps, like many of hisconfederates, have redeemed, by his bravery in the field, a characterwhich his orgies had rendered despicable. He now left Antwerp for thenorth of Holland, where, as he soon afterwards reported to Count Louis, "the beggars were as numerous as the sands on the seashore. "

His "nephew Charles, " two months afterwards, obeyed his father'sinjunction, and withdrew formally from the confederacy. 

Meantime the rumor had gone abroad that the Request of the nobles hadalready produced good fruit, that the edicts were to be mitigated, theinquisition abolished, liberty of conscience eventually to prevail. "Uponthese reports, " says a contemporary, "all the vermin of exiles andfugitives for religion, as well as those who had kept in concealment, began to lift up their heads and thrust forth their horns. " It was knownthat Margaret of Parma had ordered the inquisitors and magistrates toconduct themselves "modestly and discreetly. " It was known that the privycouncil was hard at work upon the project for "moderating" the edicts. Modestly and discreetly, Margaret of Parma, almost immediately aftergiving these orders, and while the "moderation" was still in the hands ofthe lawyers, informed her brother that she had given personal attentionto the case of a person who had snatched the holy wafer from the priest'shand at Oudenarde. This "quidam, " as she called him--for his name wasbeneath the cognizance of an Emperor's bastard daughter--had by herorders received rigorous and exemplary justice. And what was the"rigorous and exemplary justice" thus inflicted upon the "quidam?" Theprocurator of the neighboring city of Tournay has enabled us to answer. The young man, who was a tapestry weaver, Hans Tiskaen by name, had, uponthe 30th May, thrown the holy wafer upon the ground. For this crime, which was the same as that committed on Christmas-day of the previousyear by Bertrand le Blas, at Tournay, he now met with a similar althoughnot quite so severe a punishment. Having gone quietly home after doingthe deed, he was pursued, arrested, and upon the Saturday ensuing takento the market-place of Oudenarde. Here the right hand with which he hadcommitted the offence was cut off, and he was then fastened to the stakeand burned to death over a slow fire. He was fortunately not more than aquarter of an hour in torment, but he persisted in his opinions, andcalled on God for support to his last breath. 

This homely tragedy was enacted at Oudenarde, the birth place of DuchessMargaret. She was the daughter of the puissant Charles the Fifth, but hermother was only the daughter of a citizen of Oudenarde; of a "quidam"like the nameless weaver who had thus been burned by her express order. It was not to be supposed, however, that the circumstance could operatein so great a malefactor's favor. Moreover, at the same moment, she sentorders that a like punishment should be inflicted upon another personthen in a Flemish prison, for the crime of anabaptism. 

The privy council, assisted by thirteen knights of the Fleece, had beenhard at work, and the result of their wisdom was at last revealed in a"moderation" consisting of fifty-three articles. 

What now was the substance of those fifty-three articles, so painfullyelaborated by Viglius, so handsomely drawn up into shape by Councillord'Assonleville? Simply to substitute the halter for the fagot. Afterelimination of all verbiage, this fact was the only residuum. It was mostdistinctly laid down that all forms of religion except the Roman Catholicwere forbidden; that no public or secret conventicles were to be allowed;that all heretical writings were to be suppressed; that all curiousinquiries into the Scriptures were to be prohibited. Persons whoinfringed these regulations were divided into two classes--the misleadersand the misled. There was an affectation of granting mercy to persons inthe second category, while death was denounced upon those composing thefirst. It was merely an affectation; for the rambling statute was so openin all its clauses, that the Juggernaut car of persecution could bedriven through the whole of them, whenever such a course should seemexpedient. Every man or woman in the Netherlands might be placed in thelist of the misleaders, at the discretion of the officials. The pretendedmercy to the misguided was a mere delusion. 

The superintendents, preachers, teachers, ministers, sermon-makers, deacons, and other officers, were to be executed with the halter, withconfiscation of their whole property. So much was very plain. Otherheretics, however, who would abjure their heresy before the bishop, mightbe pardoned for the first offence, but if obstinate, were to be banished. This seemed an indication of mercy, at least to the repentant criminals. But who were these "other" heretics? All persons who discussed religiousmatters were to be put to death. All persons, not having studied theologyat a "renowned university, " who searched and expounded the Scriptures, were to be put to death. All persons in whose houses any act of theperverse religion should be committed, were to be put to death. Allpersons who harbored or protected ministers and teachers of any sect, were to be put to death. All the criminals thus carefully enumerated wereto be executed, whether repentant or not. If, however, they abjured theirerrors, they were to be beheaded instead of being strangled. Thus it wasobvious that almost any heretic might be brought to the halter at amoment's notice. 

Strictly speaking, the idea of death by the halter or the axe was lessshocking to the imagination than that of being burned or buried alive. Inthis respect, therefore, the edicts were softened by the proposed"Moderation. " It would, however, always be difficult to persuade anyconsiderable slumber of intelligent persons, that the infliction of aviolent death, by whatever process, on account of religious opinions, wasan act of clemency. The Netherlanders were, however, to be persuaded intothis belief. The draft of the new edict was ostentatiously called the"Moderatie, " or the "Moderation. " It was very natural, therefore, thatthe common people, by a quibble, which is the same in Flemish as inEnglish, should call the proposed "Moderation" the "Murderation. " Therough mother-wit of the people had already characterized and annihilatedthe project, while dull formalists were carrying it through thepreliminary stages. 

A vote in favor of the project having been obtained from the estates ofArtois, Hainault, and Flanders, the instructions for the envoys; BaronMontigny and Marquis Berghen, were made out in conformity to the scheme. Egmont had declined the mission, not having reason to congratulatehimself upon the diplomatic success of his visit to Spain in thepreceding year. The two nobles who consented to undertake the office werepersuaded into acceptance sorely against their will. They were aware thattheir political conduct since the King's departure from the country hadnot always been deemed satisfactory at Madrid, but they were, of course, far from suspecting the true state of the royal mind. They were both assincere Catholics and as loyal gentlemen as Granvelle, but they were notaware how continuously, during a long course of years, that personage hadrepresented them to Philip as renegades and rebels. They had maintainedthe constitutional rights of the state, and they had declined to act asexecutioners for the inquisition, but they were yet to learn that suchdemonstrations amounted to high treason. 

Montigny departed, on the 29th May, from Brussels. He left the bride towhom he had been wedded amid scenes of festivity, the precedingautumn--the unborn child who was never to behold its father's face. Hereceived warnings in Paris, by which he scorned to profit. The Spanishambassador in that city informed him that Philip's wrath at the recenttransactions in the Netherlands was high. He was most significantlyrequested, by a leading personage in France, to feign illness, or to takerefuge in any expedient by which he might avoid the fulfilment of hismission. Such hints had no effect in turning him from his course, and heproceeded to Madrid, where he arrived on the 17th of June. 

His colleague in the mission, Marquis Berghen, had been prevented fromsetting forth at the same time, by an accident which, under thecircumstances, might almost seem ominous. Walking through the palacepark, in a place where some gentlemen were playing at pall-mall, he wasaccidentally struck in the leg by a wooden ball. The injury, althoughtrifling, produced go much irritation and fever that he was confined tohis bed for several weeks. It was not until the 1st of July that he wasable to take his departure from Brussels. Both these unfortunate noblesthus went forth to fulfil that dark and mysterious destiny from which theveil of three centuries has but recently been removed. 

Besides a long historical discourse, in eighteen chapters, delivered byway of instruction to the envoys, Margaret sent a courier beforehand witha variety of intelligence concerning the late events. Alonzo del Canto, one of Philip's spies in the Netherlands, also wrote to inform the Kingthat the two ambassadors were the real authors of all the troubles thenexisting in the country. Cardinal Granvelle, too, renewed his previousstatements in a confidential communication to his Majesty, adding that nopersons more appropriate could have been selected than Berghen andMontigny, for they knew better than any one else the state of affairs inwhich they had borne the principal part. Nevertheless, Montigny, upon hisarrival in Madrid on the 17th of June, was received by Philip with muchapparent cordiality, admitted immediately to an audience, and assured inthe strongest terms that there was no dissatisfaction in the royal mindagainst the seigniors, whatever false reports might be circulated to thateffect. In other respects, the result of this and of his succeedinginterviews with the monarch was sufficiently meagre. 

It could not well be otherwise. The mission of the envoys was anelaborate farce to introduce a terrible tragedy. They were sent toprocure from Philip the abolition of the inquisition and the moderationof the edicts. At the very moment, however, of all these legislative anddiplomatic arrangements, Margaret of Parma was in possession of secretletters from Philip, which she was charged to deliver to the Archbishopof Sorrento, papal nuncio at the imperial court, then on a special visitto Brussels. This ecclesiastic had come to the Netherlands ostensibly toconfer with the Prince of Orange upon the affairs of his principality, toremonstrate with Count Culemburg, and to take measures for thereformation of the clergy. The real object of his mission, however, wasto devise means for strengthening the inquisition and suppressing heresyin the provinces. Philip, at whose request he had come, had charged himby no means to divulge the secret, as the King was anxious to have itbelieved that the ostensible was the only business which the prelate hadto perform in the country. Margaret accordingly delivered to him theprivate letters, in which Philip avowed his determination to maintain theinquisition and the edicts in all their rigor, but enjoined profoundsecrecy upon the subject. The Duchess, therefore, who knew the face ofthe cards, must have thought it a superfluous task to continue the game, which to Philip's cruel but procrastinating temperament was perhaps apleasurable excitement. 

The scheme for mitigating the edicts by the substitution of stranglingfor burning, was not destined therefore far much success either in Spainor in the provinces; but the people by whom the next great movement wasmade in the drama of the revolt, conducted themselves in a manner toshame the sovereign who oppressed, and the riotous nobles who hadundertaken to protect their liberties. 

At this very moment, in the early summer of 1566, many thousands ofburghers, merchants, peasants, and gentlemen, were seen mustering andmarching through the fields of every province, armed with arquebus, javelin, pike and broadsword. For what purpose were these gatherings?Only to hear sermons and to sing hymns in the open air, as it wasunlawful to profane the churches with such rites. This was the firstgreat popular phase of the Netherland rebellion. Notwithstanding theedicts and the inquisition with their daily hecatombs, notwithstandingthe special publication at this time throughout the country by theDuchess Regent that all the sanguinary statutes concerning religion werein as great vigor as ever, notwithstanding that Margaret offered a rewardof seven hundred crowns to the man who would bring her a preacher--deador alive, --the popular thirst for the exercises of the reformed religioncould no longer be slaked at the obscure and hidden fountains where theirpriests had so long privately ministered. 

Partly emboldened by a temporary lull in the persecution, partlyencouraged by the presentation of the Request and by the events to whichit had given rise, the Reformers now came boldly forth from their lurkingplaces and held their religious meetings in the light of day. Theconsciousness of numbers and of right had brought the conviction ofstrength. The audacity of the Reformers was wonderful to the mind ofPresident Viglius, who could find no language strong enough with which tocharacterize and to deplore such blasphemous conduct. The field-preachingseemed in the eyes of government to spread with the rapidity of amalignant pestilence. The miasma flew upon the wings of the wind. Asearly as 1562, there had been public preaching in the neighborhood ofYpres. The executions which followed, however, had for the timesuppressed the practice both in that place as well as throughout Flandersand the rest of the provinces. It now broke forth as by one impulse fromone end of the country to the other. In the latter part of June, HermannStryoker or Modet, a monk who had renounced his vows to become one of themost popular preachers in the Reformed Church, addressed a congregationof seven or eight thousand persons in the neighborhood of Ghent. PeterDathenus, another unfrocked monk, preached at various places in WestFlanders, with great effect. A man endowed with a violent, stormyeloquence, intemperate as most zealots, he was then rendering betterservices to the cause of the Reformation than he was destined to do atlater periods. 

But apostate priests were not the only preachers. To the ineffabledisgust of the conservatives in Church and State, there were men withlittle education, utterly devoid of Hebrew, of lowly station--hatters, curriers, tanners, dyers, and the like, who began to preach also;remembering, unseasonably perhaps, that the early disciples, selected bythe founder of Christianity, had not all been doctors of theology, withdiplomas from a "renowned university. " But if the nature of such men weresubdued to what it worked in, that charge could not be brought againstministers with the learning and accomplishments of Ambrose Wille, Marnier, Guy de Bray, or Francis Junius, the man whom Scaliger called the"greatest of all theologians since the days of the apostles. " Anaristocratic sarcasm could not be levelled against Peregrine de laGrange, of a noble family in Provence, with the fiery blood of southernFrance in his veins, brave as his nation, learned, eloquent, enthusiastic, who galloped to his field-preaching on horseback, and fireda pistol-shot as a signal for his congregation to give attention. 

On the 28th of June, 1566, at eleven o'clock at night, there was anassemblage of six thousand people near Tournay, at the bridge ofErnonville, to hear a sermon from Ambrose Wille, a man who had studiedtheology in Geneva, at the feet of Calvin, and who now, with a specialprice upon his head, --was preaching the doctrines he had learned. Twodays afterwards, ten thousand people assembled at the same spot, to hearPeregrine de la Grange. Governor Moulbais thundered forth a proclamationfrom the citadel, warning all men that the edicts were as rigorous asever, and that every man, woman, or child who went to these preachings, was incurring the penalty of death. The people became only the moreardent and excited. Upon Sunday, the seventh of July; twenty thousandpersons assembled at the same bridge to hear Ambrose Wille. One man inthree was armed. Some had arquebuses, others pistols, pikes, swords, pitchforks, poniards, clubs. The preacher, for whose apprehension a freshreward had been offered, was escorted to his pulpit by a hundred mountedtroopers. He begged his audience not to be scared from the word of God bymenace; assured them that although but a poor preacher himself, he held adivine commission; that he had no fear of death; that, should he fall, there were many better than he to supply his place, and fifty thousandmen to avenge his murder. 

The Duchess sent forth proclamations by hundreds. She ordered the instantsuppression of these armed assemblies and the arrest of the preachers. But of what avail were proclamations against such numbers with weapons intheir hands. Why irritate to madness these hordes of enthusiasts, whowere now entirely pacific, and who marched back to the city, afterconclusion of divine service, with perfect decorum? All classes of thepopulation went eagerly to the sermons. The gentry of the place, the richmerchants, the notables, as well as the humbler artisans and laborers, all had received the infection. The professors of the Reformed religionoutnumbered the Catholics by five or six to one. On Sundays and otherholidays, during the hours of service, Tournay was literally emptied ofits inhabitants. The streets were as silent as if war or pestilence hadswept the place. The Duchess sent orders, but she sent no troops. Thetrained-bands of the city, the cross-bow-men of St. Maurice, the archersof St. Sebastian, the sword-players of St. Christopher, could not beordered from Tournay to suppress the preaching, for they had all gone tothe preaching themselves. How idle, therefore; to send peremptory orderswithout a matchlock to enforce the command. 

Throughout Flanders similar scenes were enacted. The meetings wereencampments, for the Reformers now came to their religious services armedto the teeth, determined, if banished from the churches, to defend theirright to the fields. Barricades of upturned wagons, branches, and planks, were thrown up around the camps. Strong guards of mounted men werestationed at every avenue. Outlying scouts gave notice of approachingdanger, and guided the faithful into the enclosure. Pedlers and hawkersplied the trade upon which the penalty of death was fixed, and sold theforbidden hymn-books to all who chose to purchase. A strange andcontradictory spectacle! An army of criminals doing deeds which couldonly be expiated at the stake; an entrenched rebellion, bearding thegovernment with pike, matchlock, javelin and barricade, and all for nomore deadly purpose than to listen to the precepts of the pacific Jesus. 

Thus the preaching spread through the Walloon provinces to the northernNetherlands. Towards the end of July, an apostate monk, of singulareloquence, Peter Gabriel by name, was announced to preach at Overeen nearHarlem. This was the first field-meeting which had taken place inHolland. The people were wild with enthusiasm; the authorities besidethemselves with apprehension. People from the country flocked into thetown by thousands. The other cities were deserted, Harlem was filled tooverflowing. Multitudes encamped upon the ground the night before. Themagistrates ordered the gates to be kept closed in the morning till longafter the usual hour. It was of no avail. Bolts and bars were but smallimpediments to enthusiasts who had travelled so many miles on foot orhorseback to listen to a sermon. They climbed the walls, swam the moatand thronged to the place of meeting long before the doors had beenopened. When these could no longer be kept closed without a conflict, forwhich the magistrates were not prepared, the whole population poured outof the city with a single impulse. Tens of thousands were assembled uponthe field. The bulwarks were erected as usual, the guards were posted, the necessary precautions taken. But upon this occasion, and in thatregion there was but little danger to be apprehended. The multitude ofReformers made the edicts impossible, so long as no foreign troops werethere to enforce them. The congregation was encamped and arranged in anorderly manner. The women, of whom there were many, were placed next thepulpit, which, upon this occasion, was formed of a couple of spearsthrust into the earth, sustaining a cross-piece, against which thepreacher might lean his back. The services commenced with the singing ofa psalm by the whole vast assemblage. Clement Marot's verses, recentlytranslated by Dathenus, were then new and popular. The strains of themonarch minstrel, chanted thus in their homely but nervous mother tongueby a multitude who had but recently learned that all the poetry andrapture of devotion were not irrevocably coffined with a buried language, or immured in the precincts of a church, had never produced a moreelevating effect. No anthem from the world-renowned organ in that ancientcity ever awakened more lofty emotions than did those ten thousand humanvoices ringing from the grassy meadows in that fervid midsummer noon. When all was silent again, the preacher rose; a little, meagre man, wholooked as if he might rather melt away beneath the blazing sunshine ofJuly, than hold the multitude enchained four uninterrupted hours long, bythe magic of his tongue. His text was the 8th, 9th, and 10th verses ofthe second chapter of Ephesians; and as the slender monk spoke to hissimple audience of God's grace, and of faith in Jesus, who had descendedfrom above to save the lowliest and the most abandoned, if they would puttheir trust in Him, his hearers were alternately exalted with fervor ormelted into tears. He prayed for all conditions of men--for themselves, their friends, their enemies, for the government which had persecutedthem, for the King whose face was turned upon them in anger. At times, according to one who was present, not a dry eye was to be seen in thecrowd. When the minister had finished, he left his congregation abruptly, for he had to travel all night in order to reach Alkmaar, where he was topreach upon the following day. 

By the middle of July the custom was established outside all theprincipal cities. Camp-meetings were held in some places; as, forinstance, in the neighborhood of Antwerp, where the congregationsnumbered often fifteen thousand and on some occasions were estimated atbetween twenty and thirty thousand persons at a time; "very many ofthem, " said an eye-witness, "the best and wealthiest in the town. "

The sect to which most of these worshippers belonged was that of Calvin. In Antwerp there were Lutherans, Calvinists, and Anabaptists. TheLutherans were the richest sect, but the Calvinists the most numerous andenthusiastic. The Prince of Orange at this moment was strenuously opposedboth to Calvinism and Anabaptism, but inclining to Lutheranism. Politicalreasons at this epoch doubtless influenced his mind in religious matters. The aid of the Lutheran princes of Germany, who detested the doctrines ofGeneva, could hardly be relied upon for the Netherlanders, unless theywould adapt the Confession of Augsburg. The Prince knew that the Emperor, although inclined to the Reformation, was bitterly averse to Calvinism, and he was, therefore, desirous of healing the schism which existed inthe general Reformed Church. To accomplish this, however, would be togain a greater victory over the bigotry which was the prevailingcharacteristic of the age than perhaps could be expected. The Prince, from the first moment of his abandoning the ancient doctrines, wasdisposed to make the attempt. 

The Duchess ordered the magistrates of Antwerp to put down thesemass-meetings by means of the guild-militia. They replied that at anearlier day such a course might have been practicable, but that the sectshad become quite too numerous for coercion. If the authorities were ableto prevent the exercises of the Reformed religion within the city, itwould be as successful a result as could be expected. To prevent thepreaching outside the walls, by means of the bourgher force, was an utterimpossibility. The dilatoriness of the Sovereign placed the Regent in afrightful dilemma, but it was sufficiently obvious that the strugglecould not long be deferred. "There will soon be a hard nut to crack, "wrote Count Louis. "The King will never grant the preaching; the peoplewill never give it up, if it cost them their necks. There's a hard puffcoming upon the country before long. " The Duchess was not yet authorizedto levy troops, and she feared that if she commenced such operations, sheshould perhaps offend the King, while she at the same time might provokethe people into more effective military preparations than her own. Shefelt that for one company levied by her, the sectaries could raise ten. Moreover, she was entirely without money, even if she should otherwisethink it expedient to enrol an army. Meantime she did what she could with"public prayers, processions, fasts, sermons, exhortations, " and otherecclesiastical machinery which she ordered the bishops to put in motion. Her situation was indeed sufficiently alarming. 

Egmont, whom many of the sectaries hoped to secure as their leader incase of a civil war, showed no disposition to encourage such hopes, butas little to take up arms against the people. He went to Flanders, wherethe armed assemblages for field-preaching had become so numerous that aforce of thirty or forty thousand men might be set on foot almost at amoment's warning, and where the conservatives, in a state of alarm, desired the presence of their renowned governor. The people of Antwerp, on their part, demanded William of Orange. The Prince, who was hereditaryburgrave of the city, had at first declined the invitation of themagistracy. The Duchess united her request with the universal prayer ofthe inhabitants. Events meantime had been thickening, and suspicionincreasing. Meghen had been in the city for several days, much to thedisgust of the Reformers, by whom he was hated. Aremberg was expected tojoin him, and it was rumored that measures were secretly in progressunder the auspices of these two leading cardinalists, for introducing agarrison, together with great store of ammunition, into the city. On theother hand, the "great beggar, " Brederode, had taken up his quarters alsoin Antwerp; had been daily entertaining a crowd of roystering nobles athis hotel, previously to a second political demonstration, which willsoon be described, and was constantly parading the street, followed by aswarm of adherents in the beggar livery. The sincere Reformers were madenearly as uncomfortable by the presence of their avowed friends, as bythat of Meghen and Aremberg, and earnestly desired to be rid of them all. Long and anxious were the ponderings of the magistrates upon all thesesubjects. It was determined, at last, to send a fresh deputation toBrussels, requesting the Regent to order the departure of Meghen, Aremberg, and Brederode from Antwerp; remonstrating with her against anyplan she might be supposed to entertain of sending mercenary troops intothe city; pledging the word of the senate to keep the peace, meanwhile, by their regular force; and above all, imploring her once more, in themost urgent terms, to send thither the burgrave, as the only man who wascapable of saving the city from the calamities into which it was solikely to fall. 

The Prince of Orange being thus urgently besought, both by the governmentof Antwerp, the inhabitants of that city, and by the Regent herself, atlast consented to make the visit so earnestly demanded. On the 13th July, he arrived in Antwerp. The whole city was alive with enthusiasm. Half itspopulation seemed to have come forth from the gates to bid him welcome, lining the road for miles. The gate through which he was to pass, theramparts, the roofs of the houses were packed close, with expectant andeager faces. At least thirty thousand persons had assembled to welcometheir guest. A long cavalcade of eminent citizens had come as far asBerghen to meet him and to escort him into the city. Brederode, attendedby some of the noble confederates, rode at the head of the procession. Asthey encountered the Prince, a discharge of pistol-shots was fired by wayof salute, which was the signal for a deafening shout from the assembledmultitude. The crowd thronged about the Prince as he advanced, callinghim their preserver, their father, their only hope. Wild shouts ofwelcome rose upon every side, as he rode through the town, mingled withoccasional vociferations of "long life to the beggars. " These party crieswere instantly and sharply rebuked by Orange, who expressed, inBrederode's presence, the determination that he would make men unlearnthat mischievous watchword. He had, moreover, little relish at that timefor the tumultuous demonstrations of attachment to his person, which weretoo fervid to be censured, but too unseasonable to be approved. When thecrowd had at last been made to understand that their huzzas weredistasteful to the Prince, most of the multitude consented to disperse, feeling, however, a relief from impending danger in the presence of theman to whom they instinctively looked as their natural protector. 

The senators had come forth in a body to receive the burgrave and escorthim to the hotel prepared for him. Arrived there, he lost no time inopening the business which had brought him to Antwerp. He held at once along consultation with the upper branch of the government. Afterwards, day after day, he honestly, arduously, sagaciously labored to restore thepublic tranquillity. He held repeated deliberations with every separateportion of the little commonwealth, the senate, the council of ancients, the corporation of ward-masters, the deans of trades. Nor did he confinehis communication to these organized political bodies alone. He hadfrequent interviews with the officers of the military associations, withthe foreign merchant companies, with the guilds of "Rhetoric. " Thechambers of the "Violet" and the "Marigold" were not too frivolous orfantastic to be consulted by one who knew human nature and theconstitution of Netherland society so well as did the Prince. Night andday he labored with all classes of citizens to bring about a betterunderstanding, and to establish mutual confidence. At last by his effortstranquillity was restored. The broad-council having been assembled, itwas decided that the exercise of the Reformed religion should be excludedfrom the city, but silently tolerated in the suburbs, while an armedforce was to be kept constantly in readiness to suppress all attempts atinsurrection. The Prince had desired, that twelve hundred men should beenlisted and paid by the city, so that at least a small number ofdisciplined troops might be ready at a moment's warning; but he found itimpossible to carry the point with the council. The magistrates werewilling to hold themselves responsible for the peace of the city, butthey would have no mercenaries. 

Thus, during the remainder of July and the early part of August, wasWilliam of Orange strenuously occupied in doing what should have been theRegent's work. He was still regarded both by the Duchess and by theCalvinist party--although having the sympathies of neither, --as the onlyman in the Netherlands who could control the rising tide of a nationalrevolt. He took care, said his enemies, that his conduct at Antwerpshould have every appearance of loyalty; but they insinuated that he wasa traitor from the beginning, who was insidiously fomenting the troubleswhich he appeared to rebuke. No one doubted his genius, and all felt oraffected admiration at its display upon this critical occasion. "ThePrince of Orange is doing very great and notable services at Antwerp tothe King and to the country, " said Assonleville. "That seignior is veryskilful in managing great affairs. " Margaret of Parma wrote letters tohim fixed with the warmest gratitude, expressions of approbation, and ofwishes that he could both remain in Antwerp and return to assist her inBrussels. Philip, too, with his own pen, addressed him a letter, in whichimplicit confidence in the Prince's character was avowed, all suspicionon the part of the Sovereign indignantly repudiated, earnest thanks forhis acceptance of the Antwerp mission uttered, and a distinct refusalgiven to the earnest request made by Orange to resign his offices. ThePrince read or listened to all this commendation, and valued it exactlyat its proper worth. He knew it to be pure grimace. He was no moredeceived by it than if he had read the letter sent by Margaret to Philip, a few weeks later, in which she expressed herself as "thoroughly awarethat it was the intention of Orange to take advantage of the impendingtumults, for the purpose of conquering the provinces and of dividing thewhole territory among himself and friends. " Nothing could be more utterlyfalse than so vile and ridiculous a statement. 

The course of the Prince had hitherto been, and was still, bothconsistent and loyal. He was proceeding step by step to place the monarchin the wrong, but the only art which he was using, was to plant himselfmore firmly upon the right. It was in the monarch's power to convoke theassembly of the states-general, so loudly demanded by the whole nation, to abolish the inquisition, to renounce persecution, to accept the greatfact of the Reformation. To do so he must have ceased to be Philip. Tohave faltered in attempting to bring him into that path, the Prince musthave ceased to be William of Orange. Had he succeeded, there would havebeen no treason and no Republic of Holland. His conduct at the outbreakof the Antwerp troubles was firm and sagacious. Even had his dutyrequired him to put down the public preaching with peremptory violence, he had been furnished with no means to accomplish the purpose. Therebellion, if it were one, was already full-grown. It could not be takenby the throat and strangled with one hand, however firm. 

A report that the High Sheriff of Brabant was collecting troops bycommand of government, in order to attack the Reformers at theirfield-preachings, went far to undo the work already accomplished by thePrince. The assemblages swelled again from ten or twelve thousand totwenty-five thousand, the men all providing themselves more thoroughlywith weapons than before. Soon afterwards, the intemperate zeal ofanother individual, armed to the teeth--not, however, like the martialsheriff and his forces, with arquebus and javelin, but with the stillmore deadly weapons of polemical theology, --was very near causing ageneral outbreak. A peaceful and not very numerous congregation werelistening to one of their preachers in a field outside the town. Suddenlyan unknown individual in plain clothes and with a pragmatical demeanor, interrupted the discourse by giving a flat contradiction to some of thedoctrines advanced. The minister replied by a rebuke, and a reiterationof the disputed sentiment. --The stranger, evidently versed inecclesiastical matters, volubly and warmly responded. The preacher, a manof humble condition and moderate abilities, made as good show of argumentas he could, but was evidently no match for his antagonist. He was soonvanquished in the wordy warfare. Well he might be, for it appeared thatthe stranger was no less a personage than Peter Rythovius, a doctor ofdivinity, a distinguished pedant of Louvain, a relation of a bishop andhimself a Church dignitary. This learned professor, quite at home in hissubject, was easily triumphant, while the poor dissenter, more accustomedto elevate the hearts of his hearers than to perplex their heads, sankprostrate and breathless under the storm of texts, glosses, and hardHebrew roots with which he was soon overwhelmed. The professor's triumphwas, however, but short-lived, for the simple-minded congregation, wholoved their teacher, were enraged that he should be thus confounded. Without more ado, therefore, they laid violent hands upon the Quixoticknight-errant of the Church, and so cudgelled and belabored him bodilythat he might perhaps have lost his life in the encounter had he not beenprotected by the more respectable portion of the assembly. These persons, highly disapproving the whole proceeding, forcibly rescued him from theassailants, and carried him off to town, where the news of the incidentat once created an uproar. Here he was thrown into prison as a disturberof the peace, but in reality that he might be personally secure. The nextday the Prince of Orange, after administering to him a severe rebuke forhis ill-timed exhibition of pedantry, released him from confinement, andhad him conveyed out of the city. "This theologian;" wrote the Prince toDuchess Margaret, "would have done better, methinks, to stay at home; forI suppose he had no especial orders to perform this piece of work. "

Thus, so long as this great statesman could remain in the metropolis, histemperate firmness prevented the explosion which had so long beenexpected. His own government of Holland and Zeland, too, especiallydemanded his care. The field-preaching had spread in that region withprodigious rapidity. Armed assemblages, utterly beyond the power of thecivil authorities, were taking place daily in the neighborhood ofAmsterdam. Yet the Duchess could not allow him to visit his government inthe north. If he could be spared from Antwerp for a day, it was necessarythat he should aid her in a fresh complication with the confederatednobles in the very midst, therefore, of his Antwerp labors, he had beenobliged, by Margaret's orders, to meet a committee at Duffel. For in thissame eventful month of July a great meeting was held by the members ofthe Compromise at St. Trond, in the bishopric of Liege. They cametogether on the thirteenth of the month, and remained assembled till thebeginning of August. It was a wild, tumultuous convention, numbering somefifteen hundred cavaliers, each with his esquires and armed attendants; alarger and more important gathering than had yet been held. Brederode andCount Louis were the chieftains of the assembly, which, as may besupposed from its composition and numbers, was likely to be neither veryorderly in its demonstrations nor wholesome in its results. It was anill-timed movement. The convention was too large for deliberation, tooriotous to inspire confidence. The nobles quartered themselves everywhere in the taverns and the farm-houses of the neighborhood, while largenumbers encamped upon the open fields. There was a constant din ofrevelry and uproar, mingled with wordy warfare, and an occasionalcrossing of swords. It seemed rather like a congress of ancient, savageBatavians, assembled in Teutonic fashion to choose a king amid hoarseshouting, deep drinking, and the clash of spear and shield, than ameeting for a lofty and earnest purpose, by their civilized descendants. A crowd of spectators, landlopers, mendicants, daily aggregatedthemselves to the aristocratic assembly, joining, with natural unction, in the incessant shout of "Vivent les gueux!" It was impossible that sosoon after their baptism the self-styled beggars should repudiate allconnection with the time-honored fraternity in which they had enrolledthemselves. 

The confederates discussed--if an exchange of vociferations could becalled discussion--principally two points: whether, in case they obtainedthe original objects of their petition, they should pause or move stillfurther onward; and whether they should insist upon receiving some pledgefrom the government, that no vengeance should be taken upon them fortheir previous proceedings. Upon both questions, there was much vehemenceof argument and great difference of opinion. They, moreover, took twovery rash and very grave resolutions--to guarantee the people against allviolence on account of their creeds, and to engage a force of Germansoldiery, four thousand horse and forty companies of infantry by, "wartgeld" or retaining wages. It was evident that these gentlemen weredisposed to go fast and far. If they had been ready in the spring toreceive their baptism of wine, the "beggars" were now eager for thebaptism of blood. At the same time it must be observed that the levieswhich they proposed, not to make, but to have at command, were purely fordefence. In case the King, as it was thought probable, should visit theNetherlands with fire and sword, then there would be a nucleus ofresistance already formed. 

Upon the 18th July, the Prince of Orange, at the earnest request of theRegent, met a committee of the confederated nobles at Duffel. CountEgmont was associated with him in this duty. The conference was not verysatisfactory. The deputies from St. Trend, consisting of Brederode, Culemburg, and others, exchanged with the two seigniors the oldarguments. It was urged upon the confederates, that they had madethemselves responsible for the public tranquillity so long as the Regentshould hold to her promise; that, as the Duchess had sent twodistinguished envoys to Madrid, in order to accomplish, if possible, thewishes of the nobles, it was their duty to redeem their own pledges; thatarmed assemblages ought to be suppressed by their efforts rather thanencouraged by their example; and that, if they now exerted themselveszealously to check, the tumults, the Duchess was ready to declare, in herown-name and that of his Majesty, that the presentation of the Requesthad been beneficial. 

The nobles replied that the pledges had become a farce, that the Regentwas playing them false, that persecution was as fierce as ever, that the"Moderation" was a mockery, that the letters recommending "modesty anddiscretion" to the inquisitors had been mere waste paper, that a pricehad been set upon the heads of the preachers as if they had been wildbeasts, that there were constant threats of invasions from Spain, thatthe convocation of the states-general had been illegally deferred, thatthe people had been driven to despair, and that it was the conduct ofgovernment, not of the confederates, which had caused the Reformers tothrow off previous restraint and to come boldly forth by tens ofthousands into the fields, not to defy their King, but to worship theirGod. 

Such, in brief, was the conference of Duffel. In conclusion, a paper wasdrawn up which Brederode carried back to the convention, and which it wasproposed to submit to the Duchess for her approval. At the end of themonth, Louis of Nassau was accordingly sent to Brussels, accompanied bytwelve associates, who were familiarly called his twelve apostles. Herehe laid before her Highness in council a statement, embodying the viewsof the confederates. In this paper they asserted that they were everready to mount and ride against a foreign foe, but that they would neverdraw a sword against their innocent countrymen. They maintained thattheir past conduct deserved commendation, and that in requiring lettersof safe conduct in the names both of the Duchess and of theFleece-knights, they were governed not by a disposition to ask forpardon, but by a reluctance without such guarantees to enter intostipulations touching the public tranquillity. If, however, they shouldbe assured that the intentions of the Regent were amicable and that therewas no design to take vengeance for the past--if, moreover, she werewilling to confide in the counsels of Horn, Egmont, and Orange, and totake no important measure without their concurrence--if, above all, shewould convoke the states-general, then, and then only, were theconfederates willing to exert their energies to preserve peace, torestrain popular impetuosity and banish universal despair. 

So far Louis of Nassau and his twelve apostles. It must be confessedthat, whatever might be thought of the justice, there could be but oneopinion as to the boldness of these views. The Duchess was furious. Ifthe language held in April had been considered audacious, certainly thisnew request was, in her own words, "still more bitter to the taste andmore difficult of digestion. " She therefore answered in a veryunsatisfactory, haughty and ambiguous manner, reserving decision upontheir propositions till they had been discussed by the state council, andintimating that they would also be laid before the Knights of the Fleece, who were to hold a meeting upon the 26th of August. 

There was some further conversation without any result. Esquerdescomplained that the confederates were the mark of constant calumny, anddemanded that the slanderers should be confronted with them and punished. "I understand perfectly well, " interrupted Margaret, "you wish to takejustice into your own hands and to be King yourself. " It was furtherintimated by these reckless gentlemen, that if they should be driven byviolence into measures of self-protection, they had already securedfriends in a certain country. The Duchess, probably astonished at thefrankness of this statement, is said to have demanded furtherexplanations. The confederates replied by observing that they hadresources both in the provinces and in Germany. The state council decidedthat to accept the propositions of the confederates would be to establisha triumvirate at once, and the Duchess wrote to her brother distinctlyadvising against the acceptance of the proposal. The assembly at St. Trond was then dissolved, having made violent demonstrations which werenot followed by beneficial results, and having laid itself open tovarious suspicions, most of which were ill-founded, while some of themwere just. 

Before giving the reader a brief account of the open and the secretpolicy pursued by the government at Brussels and Madrid, in consequenceof these transactions, it is now necessary to allude to a startlingseries of events, which at this point added to the complications of thetimes, and exercised a fatal influence upon the situation of thecommonwealth. 

CHAPTER VII. 1566

 Ecclesiastical architecture in the Netherlands--The image-breaking-- Description of Antwerp Cathedral--Ceremony of the Ommegang-- Precursory disturbances--Iconoclasts at Antwerp--Incidents of the image--breaking in various cities--Events at Tournay--Preaching of Wille--Disturbance by a little boy--Churches sacked at Tournay-- Disinterment of Duke Adolphus of Gueldres--Iconoclasts defeated and massacred at Anchin--Bartholomew's Day at Valenciennes--General characteristics of the image-breaking--Testimony of contemporaries as to the honesty of the rioters--Consternation of the Duchess-- Projected flight to Mons--Advice of Horn and other seigniors-- Accord of 25th August. 

The Netherlands possessed an extraordinary number of churches andmonasteries. Their exquisite architecture and elaborate decoration hadbeen the earliest indication of intellectual culture displayed in thecountry. In the vast number of cities, towns, and villages which werecrowded upon that narrow territory, there had been, from circumstancesoperating throughout Christendom, a great accumulation of ecclesiasticalwealth. The same causes can never exist again which at an early daycovered the soil of Europe with those magnificent creations of Christianart. It was in these anonymous but entirely original achievements thatGothic genius; awaking from its long sleep of the dark ages, firstexpressed itself. The early poetry of the German races was hewn andchiselled in atone. Around the steadfast principle of devotion then sofirmly rooted in the soil, clustered the graceful and vigorous emanationsof the newly-awakened mind. All that science could invent, all that artcould embody, all that mechanical ingenuity could dare, all that wealthcould lavish, whatever there was of human energy which was panting forpacific utterance, wherever there stirred the vital principle whichinstinctively strove to create and to adorn at an epoch when vulgarviolence and destructiveness were the general tendencies of humanity, allgathered around these magnificent temples, as their aspiring pinnacles atlast pierced the mist which had so long brooded over the world. 

There were many hundreds of churches, more or less remarkable, in theNetherlands. Although a severe criticism might regret to find in theseparticular productions of the great Germanic school a development of thatpractical tendency which distinguished the Batavian and Flemishbranches, --although it might recognize a departure from that mysticprinciple which, in its efforts to symbolize the strivings of humanitytowards the infinite object of worship above, had somewhat disregardedthe wants of the worshippers below, --although the spaces might be toowide and the intercolumniations too empty, except for the convenience ofcongregations; yet there were, nevertheless, many ecclesiasticalmasterpieces, which could be regarded as very brilliant manifestations ofthe Batavian and Belgic mind during the thirteenth and fourteenthcenturies. Many were filled with paintings from a school which hadprecedence in time and merit over its sister nurseries of art in Germany. All were peopled with statues. All were filled with profusely-adornedchapels, for the churches had been enriched generation after generationby wealthy penitence, which had thus purchased absolution for crime andsmoothed a pathway to heaven. 

And now, for the space of only six or seven summer days and nights, thereraged a storm by which all these treasures were destroyed. Nearly everyone of these temples was entirely rifled of its contents; not for thepurpose of plunder, but of destruction. Hardly a province or a townescaped. Art must forever weep over this bereavement; Humanity mustregret that the reforming is thus always ready to degenerate into thedestructive principle; but it is impossible to censure very severely thespirit which prompted the brutal, but not ferocious deed. Those statues, associated as they were with the remorseless persecution which had solong desolated the provinces, had ceased to be images. They had grownhuman and hateful, so that the people arose and devoted them toindiscriminate massacre. 

No doubt the iconoclastic fury is to be regretted; for such treasures canscarcely be renewed. The age for building and decorating great cathedralsis past. Certainly, our own age, practical and benevolent, if lesspoetical, should occupy itself with the present, and project itself intothe future. It should render glory to God rather by causing wealth tofertilize the lowest valleys of humanity, than by rearing gorgeoustemples where paupers are to kneel. To clothe the naked, redeem thecriminal, feed the hungry, less by alms and homilies than by preventiveinstitutions and beneficent legislation; above all, by the diffusion ofnational education, to lift a race upon a level of culture hardlyattained by a class in earlier times, is as lofty a task as to accumulatepiles of ecclesiastical splendor. 

It would be tedious to recount in detail the events which characterizedthe remarkable image-breaking in the Netherlands. As Antwerp was thecentral point in these transactions, and as there was more wealth andmagnificence in the great cathedral of that city than in any church ofnorthern Europe, it is necessary to give a rapid outline of the eventswhich occurred there. From its exhibition in that place the spirit everywhere will best be shown. 

The Church of Our Lady, which Philip had so recently converted into acathedral, dated from the year 1124, although it may be more fairlyconsidered a work of the fourteenth century. Its college of canons hadbeen founded in another locality by Godfrey of Bouillon. The Brabantinehero, who so romantically incarnates the religious poetry of his age, whofirst mounted the walls of redeemed Jerusalem, and was its firstChristian monarch, but who refused to accept a golden diadem on the spotwhere the Saviour had been crowned with thorns; the Fleming who lived andwas the epic which the great Italian, centuries afterwards; translatedinto immortal verse, is thus fitly associated with the beautifularchitectural poem which was to grace his ancestral realms. The body ofthe church, the interior and graceful perspectives of which were notliable to the reproach brought against many Netherland churches, ofassimilating themselves already to the municipal palaces which they wereto suggest--was completed in the fourteenth century. The beautifulfacade, with its tower, was not completed till the year 1518. Theexquisite and daring spire, the gigantic stem upon which the consummateflower of this architectural creation was to be at last unfolded, was aplant of a whole century's growth. Rising to a height of nearly fivehundred feet, over a church of as many feet in length, it worthilyrepresented the upward tendency of Gothic architecture. Externally andinternally the cathedral was a true expression of the Christian principleof devotion. Amid its vast accumulation of imagery, its endlessornaments, its multiplicity of episodes, its infinite variety of details, the central, maternal principle was ever visible. Every thing pointedupwards, from the spire in the clouds to the arch which enshrined thesmallest sculptured saint in the chapels below. It was a sanctuary, notlike pagan temples, to enclose a visible deity, but an edifice wheremortals might worship an unseen Being in the realms above. 

The church, placed in the centre of the city, with the noisy streets ofthe busiest metropolis in Europe eddying around its walls, was a sacredisland in the tumultuous main. Through the perpetual twilight, tallcolumnar trunks in thick profusion grew from a floor chequered withprismatic lights and sepulchral shadows. Each shaft of the petrifiedforest rose to a preternatural height, their many branches interminglingin the space above, to form an impenetrable canopy. Foliage, flowers andfruit of colossal luxuriance, strange birds, beasts, griffins andchimeras in endless multitudes, the rank vegetation and the fantasticzoology of a fresher or fabulous world, seemed to decorate and to animatethe serried trunks and pendant branches, while the shattering symphoniesor dying murmurs of the organ suggested the rushing of the wind throughthe forest, now the full diapason of the storm and now the gentle cadenceof the evening breeze. 

Internally, the whole church was rich beyond expression. All that opulentdevotion and inventive ingenuity could devise, in wood, bronze, marble, silver, gold, precious jewelry, or blazing sacramental furniture, hadbeen profusely lavished. The penitential tears of centuries had incrustedthe whole interior with their glittering stalactites. Divided into fivenaves, with external rows of chapels, but separated by no screens orpartitions, the great temple forming an imposing whole, the effect wasthe more impressive, the vistas almost infinite in appearance. Thewealthy citizens, the twenty-seven guilds, the six military associations, the rhythmical colleges, besides many other secular or religioussodalities, had each their own chapels and altars. Tombs adorned with theeffigies of mailed crusaders and pious dames covered the floor, tatteredbanners hung in the air, the escutcheons of the Golden Fleece, an ordertypical of Flemish industry, but of which Emperors and Kings were proudto be the chevaliers, decorated the columns. The vast andbeautifully-painted windows glowed with scriptural scenes, antiqueportraits, homely allegories, painted in those brilliant and forgottencolors which Art has not ceased to deplore. The daylight melting intogloom or colored with fantastic brilliancy, priests in effulgent robeschanting in unknown language, the sublime breathing of choral music, thesuffocating odors of myrrh and spikenard, suggestive of the orientalscenery and imagery of Holy Writ, all combined to bewilder and exalt thesenses. The highest and humblest seemed to find themselves upon the samelevel within those sacred precincts, where even the bloodstained criminalwas secure, and the arm of secular justice was paralyzed. 

But the work of degeneration had commenced. The atmosphere of thecathedral was no longer holy in the eyes of increasing multitudes. Betterthe sanguinary rites of Belgic Druids, better the yell of slaughteredvictims from the "wild wood without mercy" of the pagan forefathers ofthe nation, than this fantastic intermingling of divine music, glowingcolors, gorgeous ceremonies, with all the burning, beheading andstrangling work which had characterized the system of human sacrifice forthe past half-century. 

Such was the church of Notre Dame at Antwerp. Thus indifferent or hostiletowards the architectural treasure were the inhabitants of a city, wherein a previous age the whole population would have risked their lives todefend what they esteemed the pride and garland of their metropolis. 

The Prince of Orange had been anxiously solicited by the Regent to attendthe conference at Duffel. After returning to Antwerp, he consented, inconsequence of the urgent entreaties of the senate, to delay hisdeparture until the 18th of August should be past. On the 13th of thatmonth he had agreed with the magistrates upon an ordinance, which wasaccordingly published, and by which the preachings were restricted to thefields. A deputation of merchants and others waited upon him with arequest to be permitted the exercises of the Reformed religion in thecity. This petition the Prince peremptorily refused, and the deputies, aswell as their constituents, acquiesced in the decision, "out of especialregard and respect for his person. " He, however, distinctly informed theDuchess that it would be difficult or impossible to maintain such aposition long, and that his departure from the city would probably befollowed by an outbreak. He warned her that it was very imprudent for himto leave Antwerp at that particular juncture. Nevertheless, the meetingof the Fleece-knights seemed, in Margaret's opinion, imperatively torequire his presence in Brussels. She insisted by repeated letters thathe should leave Antwerp immediately. 

Upon the 18th August, the great and time-honored ceremony of the Ommegangoccurred. Accordingly, the great procession, the principal object ofwhich was to conduct around the city a colossal image of the Virgin, issued as usual from the door of the cathedral. The image, bedizened andeffulgent, was borne aloft upon the shoulders of her adorers, followed bythe guilds, the military associations, the rhetoricians, the religioussodalities, all in glittering costume, bearing blazoned banners, andmarching triumphantly through the streets with sound of trumpet and beatof drum. The pageant, solemn but noisy, was exactly such a show as wasmost fitted at that moment to irritate Protestant minds and to lead tomischief. No violent explosion of ill-feeling, however, took place. Theprocession was followed by a rabble rout of scoffers, but they confinedthemselves to words and insulting gestures. The image was incessantlysaluted, as she was borne along--the streets, with sneers, imprecations, and the rudest, ribaldry. "Mayken! Mayken!" (little Mary) "your hour iscome. 'Tis your last promenade. The city is tired of you. " Such were thegreetings which the representative of the Holy Virgin received from mengrown weary of antiquated mummery. A few missiles were thrownoccasionally at the procession as it passed through the city, but nodamage was inflicted. When the image was at last restored to its place, and the pageant brought to a somewhat hurried conclusion, there seemedcause for congratulation that no tumult had occurred. 

On the following morning there was a large crowd collected in front ofthe cathedral. The image, instead of standing in the centre of thechurch, where, upon all former occasions, it had been accustomed duringthe week succeeding the ceremony to receive congratulatory, visits, wasnow ignominiously placed behind an iron railing within the choir. It hadbeen deemed imprudent to leave it exposed to sacrilegious hands. Theprecaution excited derision. Many vagabonds of dangerous appearance, manyidle apprentices and ragged urchins were hanging for a long time aboutthe imprisoned image, peeping through the railings, and indulging in manya brutal jest. "Mayken! Mayken!" they cried; "art thou terrified so soon?Hast flown to thy nest so early? Dost think thyself beyond the reach ofmischief? Beware, Mayken! thine hour is fast approaching!" Othersthronged around the balustrade, shouting "Vivent les gueux!" and hoarselycommanding the image to join in the beggars' cry. Then, leaving the spot, the mob roamed idly about the magnificent church, sneering at the idols, execrating the gorgeous ornaments, scoffing at crucifix and altar. 

Presently one of the rabble, a ragged fellow of mechanical aspect, in atattered black doublet and an old straw hat, ascended the pulpit. Openinga sacred volume which he found there, he began to deliver anextemporaneous and coarse caricature of a monkish sermon. Some of thebystanders applauded, some cried shame, some shouted "long live thebeggars!" some threw sticks and rubbish at the mountebank, some caughthim by the legs and strove to pull him from the place. He, on the otherhand, manfully maintained his ground, hurling back every missile, struggling with his assailants, and continuing the while to pour forth amalignant and obscene discourse. At last a young sailor, warm in theCatholic Faith, and impulsive as mariners are prone to be, ascended thepulpit from behind, sprang upon the mechanic, and flung him headlong downthe steps. The preacher grappled with his enemy as he fell, and both camerolling to the ground. Neither was much injured, but a tumult ensued. Apistol-shot was fired, and the sailor wounded in the arm. Daggers weredrawn, cudgels brandished, the bystanders taking part generally againstthe sailor, while those who protected him were somewhat bruised andbelabored before they could convey him out of the church. Nothing more, however, transpired that day, and the keepers of the cathedral wereenabled to expel the crowd and to close the doors for the night. 

Information of this tumult was brought to the senate, then assembled inthe Hotel de Ville. That body was thrown into a state of greatperturbation. In losing the Prince of Orange, they seemed to have losttheir own brains, and the first measure which they took was to despatch amessenger to implore his return. In the mean time, it was necessary thatthey should do something for themselves. It was evident that a storm wasbrewing. The pest which was sweeping so rapidly through the provinceswould soon be among them. Symptoms of the dreaded visitation were alreadybut too manifest. What precaution should: they take? Should they issue aproclamation? Such documents had been too common of late, and had losttheir virtue. It was the time not to assert but to exercise authority. Should they summon the ward-masters, and order the instant arming andmustering of their respective companies? Should they assemble thecaptains of the Military associations? Nothing better could have beendesired than such measures in cases of invasion or of ordinary tumult, but who should say how deeply the poison had sunk into the body politic;who should say with how much or how little alacrity the burgher militiawould obey the mandates of the magistracy? It would be better to issue noproclamation unless they could enforce its provisions; it would be betternot to call out the citizen soldiery unless they were likely to proveobedient. Should mercenary troops at this late hour be sent for? Wouldnot their appearance at this crisis rather inflame the rage thanintimidate the insolence of the sectaries? Never were magistrates ingreater perplexity. They knew not what course was likely to prove thesafest, and in their anxiety to do nothing wrong, the senators didnothing at all. After a long and anxious consultation, the honestburgomaster and his associates all went home to their beds, hoping thatthe threatening flame of civil tumult would die out of itself, or perhapsthat their dreams would supply them with that wisdom which seemed deniedto their waking hours. 

In the morning, as it was known that no precaution had been taken, theaudacity of the Reformers was naturally increased. Within the cathedral agreat crowd was at an early hour collected, whose savage looks and raggedappearance denoted that the day and night were not likely to pass away sopeacefully as the last. The same taunts and imprecations were hurled atthe image of the Virgin; the same howling of the beggars' cry resoundedthrough the lofty arches. For a few hours, no act of violence wascommitted, but the crowd increased. A few trifles, drifting, as usual, before the event, seemed to indicate the approaching convulsion. A verypaltry old woman excited the image-breaking of Antwerp. She had for yearsbeen accustomed to sit before the door of the cathedral with wax-tapersand wafers, earning scanty subsistence from the profits of her meagretrade, and by the small coins which she sometimes received in charity. Some of the rabble began to chaffer with this ancient hucksteress. Theyscoffed at her consecrated wares; they bandied with her ribald jests, ofwhich her public position had furnished her with a supply; they assuredher that the hour had come when her idolatrous traffic was to be foreverterminated, when she and her patroness, Mary, were to be given over todestruction together. The old woman, enraged, answered threat withthreat, and gibe with gibe. Passing from words to deeds, she began tocatch from the ground every offensive missile or weapon which she couldfind, and to lay about her in all directions. Her tormentors defendedthemselves as they could. Having destroyed her whole stock-in-trade, theyprovoked others to appear in her defence. The passers-by thronged to thescene; the cathedral was soon filled to overflowing; a furious tumult wasalready in progress. 

Many persons fled in alarm to the town-house, carrying information ofthis outbreak to the magistrates. John Van Immerzeel, Margrava ofAntwerp, was then holding communication with the senate, and awaiting thearrival of the ward-masters, whom it had at last been thought expedientto summon. Upon intelligence of this riot, which the militia, ifpreviously mustered, might have prevented, the senate determined toproceed to the cathedral in a body, with the hope of quelling the mob bythe dignity of their presence. The margrave, who was the high executiveofficer of the little commonwealth, marched down to the cathedralaccordingly, attended by the two burgomasters and all the senators. Atfirst their authority, solicitations, and personal influence, produced agood effect. Some of those outside consented to retire, and the tumultpartially subsided within. As night, however, was fast approaching, manyof the mob insisted upon remaining for evening mass. They were informedthat there would be none that night, and that for once the people couldcertainly dispense with their vespers. 

Several persons now manifesting an intention of leaving the cathedral, itwas suggested to the senators that if, they should lead the way, thepopulace would follow in their train, and so disperse to their homes. Theexcellent magistrates took the advice, not caring, perhaps, to fulfil anylonger the dangerous but not dignified functions of police officers. Before departing, they adopted the precaution of closing all the doors ofthe church, leaving a single one open, that the rabble still remainingmight have an opportunity to depart. It seemed not to occur to thesenators that the same gate would as conveniently afford an entrance forthose without as an egress for those within. That unlooked-for eventhappened, however. No sooner had the magistrates retired than the rabbleburst through the single door which had been left open, overpowered themargrave, who, with a few attendants, had remained behind, vainlyendeavoring by threats and exhortations to appease the tumult, drove himignominiously from the church, and threw all the other portals wide open. Then the populace flowed in like an angry sea. The whole of the cathedralwas at the mercy of the rioters, who were evidently bent on mischief. Thewardens and treasurers of the church, after a vain attempt to secure afew of its most precious possessions, retired. They carried the news tothe senators, who, accompanied by a few halberdmen, again ventured toapproach the spot. It was but for a moment, however, for, appalled by thefurious sounds which came from within the church, as if subterranean andinvisible forces were preparing a catastrophe which no human power couldwithstand, the magistrates fled precipitately from the scene. Fearingthat the next attack would be upon the town-house, they hastened toconcentrate at that point their available forces, and left the statelycathedral to its fate. 

And now, as the shadows of night were deepening the perpetual twilight ofthe church, the work of destruction commenced. Instead of evening massrose the fierce music of a psalm, yelled by a thousand angry voices. Itseemed the preconcerted signal for a general attack. A band of maraudersflew upon the image of the Virgin, dragged it forth from its receptacle, plunged daggers into its inanimate body, tore off its jewelled andembroidered garments, broke the whole figure into a thousand pieces, andscattered the fragments along the floor. A wild shout succeeded, and thenthe work which seemed delegated to a comparatively small number of theassembled crowd, went on with incredible celerity. Some were armed withaxes, some with bludgeons, some with sledge-hammers; others broughtladders, pulleys, ropes, and levers. Every statue was hurled from itsniche, every picture torn from the wall, every wonderfully-painted windowshivered to atoms, every ancient monument shattered, every sculptureddecoration, however inaccessible in appearance, hurled to the ground. Indefatigably, audaciously, --endowed, as it seemed, with preternaturalstrength and nimbleness, these furious iconoclasts clambered up the dizzyheights, shrieking and chattering like malignant apes, as they tore offin triumph the slowly-matured fruit of centuries. In a space of timewonderfully brief, they had accomplished their task. 

A colossal and magnificent group of the Saviour crucified between twothieves adorned the principal altar. The statue of Christ was wrenchedfrom its place with ropes and pulleys, while the malefactors, with bitterand blasphemous irony, were left on high, the only representatives of themarble crowd which had been destroyed. A very beautiful piece ofarchitecture decorated the choir, --the "repository, " as it was called, inwhich the body of Christ was figuratively enshrined. This much-admiredwork rested upon a single column, but rose, arch upon arch, pillar uponpillar, to the height of three hundred feet, till quite lost in the vaultabove. "It was now shattered into a million pieces. " The statues, images, pictures, ornaments, as they lay upon the ground, were broken withsledge-hammers, hewn with axes, trampled, torn; and beaten into shreds. Atroop of harlots, snatching waxen tapers from the altars, stood aroundthe destroyers and lighted them at their work. Nothing escaped theiromnivorous rage. They desecrated seventy chapels, forced open all thechests of treasure, covered their own squalid attire with the gorgeousrobes of the ecclesiastics, broke the sacred bread, poured out thesacramental wine into golden chalices, quaffing huge draughts to thebeggars' health; burned all the splendid missals and manuscripts, andsmeared their shoes with the sacred oil, with which kings and prelateshad been anointed. It seemed that each of these malicious creatures musthave been endowed with the strength of a hundred giants. How else, in thefew brief hours of a midsummer night, could such a monstrous desecrationhave been accomplished by a troop which, according to all accounts, wasnot more than one hundred in number. There was a multitude of spectators, as upon all such occasions, but the actual spoilers were very few. 

The noblest and richest temple of the Netherlands was a wreck, but thefury of the spoilers was excited, not appeased. Each seizing a burningtorch, the whole herd rushed from the cathedral, and swept howlingthrough the streets. "Long live the beggars!" resounded through thesultry midnight air, as the ravenous pack flew to and fro, smiting everyimage of the Virgin, every crucifix, every sculptured saint, everyCatholic symbol which they met with upon their path. All night long, theyroamed from one sacred edifice to another, thoroughly destroying as theywent. Before morning they had sacked thirty churches within the citywalls. They entered the monasteries, burned their invaluable libraries, destroyed their altars, statues, pictures, and descending into thecellars, broached every cask which they found there, pouring out in onegreat flood all the ancient wine and ale with which those holy men hadbeen wont to solace their retirement from generation to generation. Theyinvaded the nunneries, whence the occupants, panic-stricken, fled forrefuge to the houses of their friends and kindred. The streets werefilled with monks and nuns, running this way and that, shrieking andfluttering, to escape the claws of these fiendish Calvinists. The terrorwas imaginary, for not the least remarkable feature in these transactionswas, that neither insult nor injury was offered to man or woman, and thatnot a farthing's value of the immense amount of property destroyed, wasappropriated. It was a war not against the living, but against gravenimages, nor was the sentiment which prompted the onslaught in the leastcommingled with a desire of plunder. The principal citizens of Antwerp, expecting every instant that the storm would be diverted from theecclesiastical edifices to private dwellings, and that robbery, rape, andmurder would follow sacrilege, remained all night expecting the attack, and prepared to defend their hearths, even if the altars were profaned. The precaution was needless. It was asserted by the Catholics that theconfederates and other opulent Protestants had organized this company ofprofligates for the meagre pittance of ten stivers day. On the otherhand, it was believed by many that the Catholics had themselves plottedthe whole outrage in order to bring odium upon the Reformers. Bothstatements were equally unfounded. The task was most thoroughlyperformed, but it was prompted: by a furious fanaticism, not by basermotives. 

Two days and nights longer the havoc raged unchecked through all thechurches of Antwerp and the neighboring villages. Hardly a statue orpicture escaped destruction. Fortunately, the illustrious artist, whoselabors were destined in the next generation to enrich and ennoble thecity, Rubens, most profound of colorists, most dramatic--of artists;whose profuse tropical genius seemed to flower the more luxuriantly, asif the destruction wrought by brutal hands were to be compensated by thecreative energy of one, divine spirit, had not yet been born. Of thetreasures which existed the destruction was complete. Yet the rage wasdirected exclusively against stocks and stones. Not a man was wounded nora woman outraged. Prisoners, indeed, who had been languishing hopelesslyin dungeons were liberated. A monk, who had been in the prison of theBarefoot Monastery, for twelve years, recovered his freedom. Art wastrampled in the dust, but humanity deplored no victims. 

These leading features characterized the movement every where. Theprocess was simultaneous and almost universal. It was difficult to saywhere it began and where it ended. A few days in the midst of Augustsufficed for the whole work. The number of churches desecrated has neverbeen counted. In the single province of Flanders, four hundred weresacked. In Limburg, Luxemburg, and Namur, there was no image-breaking. InMechlin, seventy or eighty persons accomplished the work thoroughly, inthe very teeth of the grand council, and of an astonished magistracy. 

In Tournay, a city distinguished for its ecclesiastical splendor, thereform had been making great progress during the summer. At the same timethe hatred between the two religions had been growing more and moreintense. Trifles and serious matters alike fed the mutual animosity. 

A tremendous outbreak had been nearly occasioned by an insignificantincident. A Jesuit of some notoriety had been preaching a glowingdiscourse in the pulpit of Notre Dane. He earnestly avowed his wish thathe were good enough to die for all his hearers. He proved todemonstration that no man should shrink from torture or martyrdom inorder to sustain the ancient faith. As he was thus expatiating, hisfervid discourse was suddenly interrupted by three sharp, sudden blows, of a very peculiar character, struck upon the great portal of the Church. The priest, forgetting his love for martyrdom, turned pale and droppedunder the pulpit. Hurrying down the steps, he took refuge in the vestry, locking and barring the door. The congregation shared in his panic: "Thebeggars are coming, " was the general cry. There was a horrible tumult, which extended through the city as the congregation poured precipitatelyout of the Cathedral, to escape a band of destroying and furiousCalvinists. Yet when the shock had a little subsided, it was discoveredthat a small urchin was the cause of the whole tumult. Having beenbathing in the Scheldt, he had returned by way of the church with acouple of bladders under his arm. He had struck these against the door ofthe Cathedral, partly to dry them, partly from a love of mischief. Thus agreat uproar, in the course of which it had been feared that Toumay wasto be sacked and drenched in blood, had been caused by a little wantonboy who had been swimming on bladders. 

This comedy preceded by a few days only the actual disaster. On the 22dof August the news reached Tournay that the churches in Antwerp, Ghent, and many other places, had been sacked. There was an instantaneousmovement towards imitating the example on the same evening. Pasquier dela Barre, procureur-general of the city, succeeded by much entreaty intranquillizing the people for the night. The "guard of terror" was set, and hopes were entertained that the storm might blow over. Theexpectation, was vain. At daybreak next day, the mob swept upon thechurches and stripped them to the very walls. Pictures, statues; organs, ornaments, chalices of silver and gold, reliquaries, albs, chasubles, copes, ciboriea, crosses, chandeliers, lamps; censers, all of richestmaterial, glittering with pearls, rubies, and other precious stones, werescattered in heaps of ruin upon the ground. 

As the Spoilers burrowed among the ancient tombs, they performed, in oneor two instances, acts of startling posthumous justice. The embalmed bodyof Duke Adolphus of Gueldres, last of the Egmonts, who had reigned inthat province, was dragged from its sepulchre and recognized. Although ithad been there for ninety years, it was as uncorrupted, "Owing to theexcellent spices which had preserved it from decay, " as upon the day ofburial. Thrown upon the marble floor of the church, it lay several daysexposed to the execrations of the multitude. The Duke had committed acrime against his father, in consequence of which the province which hadbeen ruled by native races, had passed under the dominion of Charles theBold. Weary of waiting for the old Duke's inheritance, he had risenagainst him in open rebellion. Dragging him from his bed at midnight inthe depth of winter, he had compelled the old man, with no covering buthis night gear, to walk with naked feet twenty-five miles over ice andsnow from Grave to Buren, while he himself performed the same journey inhis company on horseback. He had then thrown him into a dungeon beneaththe tower of Buren castle, and kept him a close prisoner for six months. 

 [Memoires de Philippe de Comines (Loud. Et Paris, 1747), liv. Iv. 194-196. In the Royal Gallery at Berlin is a startling picture by Rembrandt, in which the old Duke is represented looking out of the bars of his dungeon at his son, who is threatening him with uplifted hand and savage face. No subject could be imagined better adapted to the gloomy and sarcastic genius of that painter. ]

At last, the Duke of Burgundy summoned the two before his council, andproposed that Adolphus should allow his father 6000 florins annually, with the title of Duke till his death. "He told us, " said Comines, "thathe would sooner throw the old man head-foremost down a well and jump inhimself afterwards. His father had been Duke forty-four years, and it wastime for him to retire. " Adolphus being thus intractable, had been keptin prison till after the death of Charles the Bold. To the memorableinsurrection of Ghent, in the time of the Lady Mary, he owed his liberty. The insurgent citizens took him from prison, and caused him to lead themin their foray against Tournay. Beneath the walls of that city he wasslain, and buried under its cathedral. And now as if his offence had notbeen sufficiently atoned for by the loss of his ancestral honors, hiscaptivity, and his death, the earth, after the lapse of nearly a century, had cast him forth from her bosom. There, once more beneath the sunlight, amid a ribald crew of a later generation which had still preserved thememory of his sin, lay the body of the more than parricide, whom"excellent spices" had thus preserved from corruption, only to be themark of scorn and demoniac laughter. 

A large assemblage of rioters, growing in numbers as they advanced, sweptover the province of Tournay, after accomplishing the sack of the citychurches. Armed with halberds, hammers, and pitchforks, they carried onthe war, day after day, against the images. At the convent ofMarchiennes, considered by contemporaries the most beautiful abbey in allthe Netherlands, they halted to sing the ten commandments in Marot'sverse. Hardly had the vast chorus finished the precept against gravenimages;

 Taiiler ne to feras imaige De quelque chose que ce soit, Sy bonneur luy fail on hommaige, Bon Dieu jalousie en recoit, when the whole mob seemed seized with sudden madness. Without waiting tocomplete the Psalm, they fastened upon the company of marble martyrs, asif they had possessed sensibility to feel the blows inflicted. In an hourthey had laid the whole in ruins. 

Having accomplished this deed, they swept on towards Anchin. Here, however, they were confronted by the Seigneur de la Tour, who, at thehead of a small company of peasants, attacked the marauders and gained acomplete victory. Five or six hundred of them were slain, others weredrowned in the river and adjacent swamps, the rest were dispersed. It wasthus proved that a little more spirit upon the part of the orderlyportion of the inhabitants, might have brought about a different resultthan the universal image-breaking. 

In Valenciennes, "the tragedy, " as an eye-witness calls it, was performedupon Saint Bartholomew's day. It was, however, only a tragedy of statues. Hardly as many senseless stones were victims as there were to be livingHuguenots sacrificed in a single city upon a Bartholomew which was fastapproaching. In the Valenciennes massacre, not a human being was injured. 

Such in general outline and in certain individual details, was thecelebrated iconomachy of the Netherlands. The movement was a suddenexplosion of popular revenge against the symbols of that Church fromwhich the Reformers had been enduring such terrible persecution. It wasalso an expression of the general sympathy for the doctrines which hadtaken possession of the national heart. It was the depravation of thatinstinct which had in the beginning of the summer drawn Calvinists andLutherans forth in armed bodies, twenty thousand strong, to worship Godin the open fields. The difference between the two phenomena was, thatthe field-preaching was a crime committed by the whole mass of theReformers; men, women, and children confronting the penalties of death, by a general determination, while the imagebreaking was the act of asmall portion of the populace. A hundred persons belonging to the lowestorder of society sufficed for the desecration of the Antwerp churches. Itwas, said Orange, "a mere handful of rabble" who did the deed. SirRichard Clough saw ten or twelve persons entirely sack church afterchurch, while ten thousand spectators looked on, indifferent orhorror-struck. The bands of iconoclasts were of the lowest character, andfew in number. Perhaps the largest assemblage was that which ravaged theprovince of Tournay, but this was so weak as to be entirely routed by asmall and determined force. The duty of repression devolved upon bothCatholics and Protestants. Neither party stirred. All seemed overcomewith special wonder as the tempest swept over the land. 

The ministers of the Reformed religion, and the chiefs of the liberalparty, all denounced the image-breaking. Francis Junius bitterlyregretted such excesses. Ambrose Wille, pure of all participation in thecrime, stood up before ten thousand Reformers at Tournay--even while thestorm was raging in the neighboring cities, and, when many voices aroundhim were hoarsely commanding similar depravities to rebuke the outragesby which a sacred cause was disgraced. The Prince of Orange, in hisprivate letters, deplored the riots, and stigmatized the perpetrators. Even Brederode, while, as Suzerain of his city of Viane, he ordered theimages there to be quietly taken from the churches, characterized thispopular insurrection as insensate and flagitious. Many of the leadingconfederates not only were offended with the proceedings, but, in theireagerness to chastise the iconoclasts and to escape from a league ofwhich they were weary, began to take severe measures against theMinisters and Reformers, of whom they had constituted themselves in Aprilthe especial protectors. 

The next remarkable characteristic of these tumults was the almost entireabstinence of the rioters from personal outrage and from pillage. Thetestimony of a very bitter, but honest Catholic at Valenciennes, isremarkable upon this point. "Certain chroniclers, " said he, "have greatlymistaken the character of this image-breaking. It has been said that theCalvinists killed a hundred priests in this city, cutting some of theminto pieces, and burning others over a slow fire. I remember very wellevery thing which happened upon that abominable day, and I can affirmthat not a single priest was injured. The Huguenots took good care not toinjure in any way the living images. " This was the case every where. Catholic and Protestant writers agree that no deeds of violence werecommitted against man or woman. 

It would be also very easy to accumulate a vast weight of testimony as totheir forbearance from robbery. They destroyed for destruction's sake, not for purposes of plunder. 

Although belonging to the lowest classes of society, they left heaps ofjewellery, of gold and silver plate, of costly embroidery, lying unheededupon the ground. They felt instinctively that a great passion would becontaminated by admixture with paltry motives. In Flanders a company ofrioters hanged one of their own number for stealing articles to the valueof five Shillings. In Valenciennes the iconoclasts were offered largesums if they would refrain from desecrating the churches of that city, but they rejected the proposal with disdain. The honest Catholic burgherwho recorded the fact, observed that he did so because of the manymisrepresentations on the subject, not because he wished to flatterheresy and rebellion. 

At Tournay, the greatest scrupulousness was observed upon this point. Thefloor of the cathedral was strewn with "pearls and precious stones, withchalices and reliquaries of silver and gold;" but the ministers of thereformed religion, in company with the magistrates, came to the spot, andfound no difficulty, although utterly without power to prevent the storm, in taking quiet possession of the wreck. "We had every thing of value, "says Procureur-General De la Barre, "carefully inventoried, weighed, locked in chests, and placed under a strict guard in the prison of theHalle, to which one set of keys were given to the ministers, and anotherto the magistrates. " Who will dare to censure in very severe languagethis havoc among stocks and stones in a land where so many living men andwomen, of more value than many statues, had been slaughtered by theinquisition, and where Alva's "Blood Tribunal" was so soon to eclipseeven that terrible institution in the number of its victims and theamount of its confiscations?

Yet the effect of the riots was destined to be most disastrous for a timeto the reforming party. It furnished plausible excuses for many lukewarmfriends of their cause to withdraw from all connection with it. Egmontdenounced the proceedings as highly flagitious, and busied himself withpunishing the criminals in Flanders. The Regent was beside herself withindignation and terror. Philip, when he heard the news, fell into aparoxysm of frenzy. "It shall cost them dear!" he cried, as he tore hisbeard for rage; "it shall cost them dear! I swear it by the soul of myfather!" The Reformation in the Netherlands, by the fury of thesefanatics, was thus made apparently to abandon the high ground upon whichit had stood in the early summer. The sublime spectacle of themultitudinous field-preaching was sullied by the excesses of theimage-breaking. The religious war, before imminent, became inevitable. 

Nevertheless, the first effect of the tumults was a temporary advantageto the Reformers. A great concession was extorted from the fears of theDuchess Regent, who was certainly placed in a terrible position. Herconduct was not heroic, although she might be forgiven for trepidation. Her treachery, however, under these trying circumstances was less venial. At three o'clock in the morning of the 22nd of August, Orange, Egmont, Horn, Hoogatraaten, Mansfeld, and others were summoned to the palace. They found her already equipped for flight, surrounded by herwaiting-women, chamberlains and lackeys, while the mules and hackneysstood harnessed in the court-yard, and her body-guard were prepared tomount at a moment's notice. She announced her intention of retreating atonce to Mons, in which city, owing to Aerschot's care, she hoped to findrefuge against the fury of the rebellion then sweeping the country. Heralarm was almost beyond control. She was certain that the storm was readyto burst upon Brussels, and that every Catholic was about to be massacredbefore her eyes. Aremberg, Berlaymont, and Noircarmes were with theDuchess when the other seigniors arrived. 

A part of the Duke of Aerschot's company had been ordered out to escortthe projected flight to Mons. Orange, Horn, Egmont, and Hoogstraatenimplored her to desist from her fatal resolution. They represented thatsuch a retreat before a mob would be the very means of ruining thecountry. They denounced all persons who had counselled the scheme, asenemies of his Majesty and herself. They protested their readiness to dieat her feet in her defence, but besought her not to abandon the post ofduty in the hour of peril. While they were thus anxiously debating, Viglius entered the chamber. With tears streaming down her cheeks, Margaret turned to the aged President, uttering fierce reproaches anddesponding lamentations. Viglius brought the news that the citizens hadtaken possession of the gates, and were resolved not to permit herdeparture from the city. He reminded her, according to the indispensablepractice of all wise counsellors, that he had been constantly predictingthis result. He, however, failed in administering much consolation, or insuggesting any remedy. He was, in truth, in as great a panic as herself, and it was, according to the statement of the Duchess, mainly in order tosave the President from threatened danger, that she eventually resolvedto make concessions. "Viglius, " wrote Margaret to Philip, "is so muchafraid of being cut to pieces, that his timidity has become incredible. "Upon the warm assurance of Count Horn, that he would enable her to escapefrom the city, should it become necessary, or would perish in theattempt, a promise in which he was seconded by the rest of the seigniors, she consented to remain for the day in her palace. --Mansfeld wasappointed captain-general of the city; Egmont, Horn, Orange, and theothers agreed to serve under his orders, and all went down together tothe townhouse. The magistrates were summoned, a general meeting of thecitizens was convened, and the announcement made of Mansfeld'sappointment, together with an earnest appeal to all honest men to supportthe Government. The appeal was answered by a shout of unanimousapprobation, an enthusiastic promise to live or die with the Regent, andthe expression of a resolution to permit neither reformed preaching norimage-breaking within the city. 

Nevertheless, at seven o'clock in the evening, the Duchess again sent forthe seigniors. She informed them that she had received fresh and certaininformation, that the churches were to be sacked that very night; thatViglius, Berlaymont, and Aremberg were to be killed, and that herself andEgmont were to be taken prisoners. She repeated many times that she hadbeen ill-advised, expressed bitter regret at having deferred her flightfrom the city, and called upon those who had obstructed her plan, now tofulfil their promises. Turning fiercely upon Count Horn, she uttered avolley of reproaches upon his share in the transaction. "You are thecause, " said she, "that I am now in this position. Why do you not redeemyour pledge and enable me to leave the place at once. " Horn replied thathe was ready to do so if she were resolved to stay no longer. He would atthe instant cut his way through the guard at the Caudenberg gate, andbring her out in safety, or die in the effort. At the same time heassured her that he gave no faith to the idle reports flying about thecity, reminded her that nobles, magistrates, and citizens were united inher defence, and in brief used the same arguments which had before beenused to pacify her alarm. The nobles were again successful in enforcingtheir counsels, the Duchess was spared the ignominy and the disaster of aretreat before an insurrection which was only directed against statues, and the ecclesiastical treasures of Brussels were saved from sacrilege. 

On the 25th August came the crowning act of what the Reformers consideredtheir most complete triumph, and the Regent her deepest degradation. Itwas found necessary under the alarming aspect of affairs, that liberty ofworship, in places where it had been already established, should beaccorded to the new religion. Articles of agreement to this effect wereaccordingly drawn up and exchanged between the Government and Lewis ofNassau, attended by fifteen others of the confederacy. A correspondingpledge was signed by them, that so long as the Regent was true to herengagement, they would consider their previously existing leagueannulled, and would assist cordially in every endeavor to maintaintranquillity and support the authority of his Majesty. The importantAccord was then duly signed by the Duchess. It declared that theinquisition was abolished, that his Majesty would soon issue a newgeneral edict, expressly and unequivocally protecting the nobles againstall evil consequences from past transactions, that they were to beemployed in the royal service, and that public preaching according to theforms of the new religion was to be practised in places where it hadalready taken place. Letters general were immediately despatched to thesenates of all the cities, proclaiming these articles of agreement andordering their execution. Thus for a fleeting moment there was a thrillof joy throughout the Netherlands. The inquisition was thought foreverabolished, the era of religious reformation arrived. 

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

 All denounced the image-breaking Anxiety to do nothing wrong, the senators did nothing at all Before morning they had sacked thirty churches Bigotry which was the prevailing characteristic of the age Enriched generation after generation by wealthy penitence Fifty thousand persons in the provinces (put to death) Furious fanaticism Lutheran princes of Germany, detested the doctrines of Geneva Monasteries, burned their invaluable libraries No qualities whatever but birth and audacity to recommend him Notre Dame at Antwerp Persons who discussed religious matters were to be put to death Premature zeal was prejudicial to the cause Purchased absolution for crime and smoothed a pathway to heaven Rearing gorgeous temples where paupers are to kneel Schism which existed in the general Reformed Church Storm by which all these treasures were destroyed (in 7 days) The noblest and richest temple of the Netherlands was a wreck Tyrannical spirit of Calvinism Would not help to burn fifty or sixty thousand Netherlanders

 ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS THE DUTCH REPUBLIC, 1555-1566, Complete:

 A pleasantry called voluntary contributions or benevolences A country disinherited by nature of its rights Absolution for incest was afforded at thirty-six livres Achieved the greatness to which they had not been born Advancing age diminished his tendency to other carnal pleasures Affecting to discredit them All offices were sold to the highest bidder All denounced the image-breaking All his disciples and converts are to be punished with death All reading of the scriptures (forbidden) Altercation between Luther and Erasmus, upon predestination An hereditary papacy, a perpetual pope-emperor An inspiring and delightful recreation (auto-da-fe) Announced his approaching marriage with the Virgin Mary Annual harvest of iniquity by which his revenue was increased Anxiety to do nothing wrong, the senators did nothing at all Arrested on suspicion, tortured till confession As ready as papists, with age, fagot, and excommunication Attacking the authority of the pope Attempting to swim in two waters Batavian legion was the imperial body guard Beating the Netherlanders into Christianity Before morning they had sacked thirty churches Bigotry which was the prevailing characteristic of the age Bishop is a consecrated pirate Bold reformer had only a new dogma in place of the old ones Brethren, parents, and children, having wives in common Burned alive if they objected to transubstantiation Burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive (100, 000) Charles the Fifth autocrat of half the world Condemning all heretics to death Consign to the flames all prisoners whatever (Papal letter) Courage of despair inflamed the French Craft meaning, simply, strength Criminal whose guilt had been established by the hot iron Criminals buying Paradise for money Crusades made great improvement in the condition of the serfs Decrees for burning, strangling, and burying alive Democratic instincts of the ancient German savages Denies the utility of prayers for the dead Despot by birth and inclination (Charles V. ) Difference between liberties and liberty Dispute between Luther and Zwingli concerning the real presence Dissimulation and delay Divine right Drank of the water in which, he had washed Endure every hardship but hunger English Puritans Enormous wealth (of the Church) which engendered the hatred Enriched generation after generation by wealthy penitence Erasmus encourages the bold friar Erasmus of Rotterdam Even for the rape of God's mother, if that were possible Excited with the appearance of a gem of true philosophy Executions of Huss and Jerome of Prague Fable of divine right is invented to sanction the system Felix Mants, the anabaptist, is drowned at Zurich Few, even prelates were very dutiful to the pope Fiction of apostolic authority to bind and loose Fifty thousand persons in the provinces (put to death) Fishermen and river raftsmen become ocean adventurers For myself I am unworthy of the honor (of martyrdom) For women to lament, for men to remember Forbids all private assemblies for devotion Force clerical--the power of clerks Furious fanaticism Gallant and ill-fated Lamoral Egmont Gaul derided the Roman soldiers as a band of pigmies German finds himself sober--he believes himself ill Govern under the appearance of obeying Great science of political equilibrium Great Privilege, the Magna Charta of Holland Guarantees of forgiveness for every imaginable sin Habeas corpus Halcyon days of ban, book and candle He knew men, especially he knew their weaknesses He did his best to be friends with all the world Heresy was a plant of early growth in the Netherlands His imagination may have assisted his memory in the task History shows how feeble are barriers of paper Holland, England, and America, are all links of one chain I would carry the wood to burn my own son withal In Holland, the clergy had neither influence nor seats Informer, in case of conviction, should be entitled to one half Inquisition of the Netherlands is much more pitiless Inquisition was not a fit subject for a compromise Insinuating suspicions when unable to furnish evidence Invented such Christian formulas as these (a curse) Inventing long speeches for historical characters July 1st, two Augustine monks were burned at Brussels King of Zion to be pinched to death with red-hot tongs Labored under the disadvantage of never having existed Learn to tremble as little at priestcraft as at swordcraft Let us fool these poor creatures to their heart's content Licences accorded by the crown to carry slaves to America Little grievances would sometimes inflame more than vast Long succession of so many illustrious obscure Look through the cloud of dissimulation Lutheran princes of Germany, detested the doctrines of Geneva Made to swing to and fro over a slow fire Maintaining the attitude of an injured but forgiving Christian Man had only natural wrongs (No natural rights) Many greedy priests, of lower rank, had turned shop-keepers Monasteries, burned their invaluable libraries More accustomed to do well than to speak well No one can testify but a householder No calumny was too senseless to be invented No law but the law of the longest purse No qualities whatever but birth and audacity to recommend him Not of the stuff of which martyrs are made (Erasmus) Notre Dame at Antwerp Nowhere was the persecution of heretics more relentless Obstinate, of both sexes, to be burned Often much tyranny in democracy One golden grain of wit into a sheet of infinite platitude Orator was, however, delighted with his own performance Others go to battle, says the historian, these go to war Panegyrists of royal houses in the sixteenth century Pardon for murder, if not by poison, was cheaper Pardon for crimes already committed, or about to be committed Paying their passage through, purgatory Perpetually dropping small innuendos like pebbles Persons who discussed religious matters were to be put to death Petty passion for contemptible details Philip, who did not often say a great deal in a few words Planted the inquisition in the Netherlands Poisoning, for example, was absolved for eleven ducats Pope and emperor maintain both positions with equal logic Power to read and write helped the clergy to much wealth Premature zeal was prejudicial to the cause Procrastination was always his first refuge Promises which he knew to be binding only upon the weak Purchased absolution for crime and smoothed a pathway to heaven Rashness alternating with hesitation Readiness to strike and bleed at any moment in her cause Rearing gorgeous temples where paupers are to kneel Repentant females to be buried alive Repentant males to be executed with the sword Revocable benefices or feuds Ruinous honors Sale of absolutions was the source of large fortunes to the priests Same conjury over ignorant baron and cowardly hind Scaffold was the sole refuge from the rack Schism which existed in the general Reformed Church Scoffing at the ceremonies and sacraments of the Church Secret drowning was substituted for public burning Sharpened the punishment for reading the scriptures in private Slavery was both voluntary and compulsory Soldier of the cross was free upon his return Sonnets of Petrarch Sovereignty was heaven-born, anointed of God St. Peter's dome rising a little nearer to the clouds St. Bartholomew was to sleep for seven years longer Storm by which all these treasures were destroyed (in 7 days) Tanchelyn Taxation upon sin Ten thousand two hundred and twenty individuals were burned That vile and mischievous animal called the people The noblest and richest temple of the Netherlands was a wreck The Gaul was singularly unchaste The vivifying becomes afterwards the dissolving principle The bad Duke of Burgundy, Philip surnamed "the Good, " The egg had been laid by Erasmus, hatched by Luther These human victims, chained and burning at the stake They had at last burned one more preacher alive Thousands of burned heretics had not made a single convert Thus Hand-werpen, hand-throwing, became Antwerp To think it capable of error, is the most devilish heresy of all To prefer poverty to the wealth attendant upon trade Torquemada's administration (of the inquisition) Tranquillity of despotism to the turbulence of freedom Two witnesses sent him to the stake, one witness to the rack Tyrannical spirit of Calvinism Understood the art of managing men, particularly his superiors Upon one day twenty-eight master cooks were dismissed Villagers, or villeins We believe our mothers to have been honest women When the abbot has dice in his pocket, the convent will play William of Nassau, Prince of Orange Wiser simply to satisfy himself Would not help to burn fifty or sixty thousand Netherlanders