the Forest of Vincennes, he found himself alone with the King, who
at once began to talk of all his plans and schemes, of which he was
full to overflowing. The gist of the matter was a plot just formed
between himself and the other Catholic sovereigns to put a final end to
Protestantism or heresy. They had, Henry confided to Orange, solemnly
bound themselves to kill all the converts to the New Religion in France
and the Netherlands, and the Duke of Alva—a Spaniard and fellow-hostage
of Orange—was to carry out their schemes. The King described exactly
how they would set about ridding the world of “that accursed vermin,”
how they were to be discovered and how massacred. In his excitement and
enthusiasm the French King never observed how Orange was taking it. He
believed him to be party to the whole arrangement. He failed to notice
that Orange never opened his lips or spoke a word—for though absolutely
horrified, the Prince managed to control his expression and to remain
silent—and thus he earned his well-known but misleading title. But
Orange, hearing all this, made up his mind. His purpose was fixed,
and as soon as possible he got permission to visit the Netherlands,
where he was determined to persuade the people to show opposition to
the presence of the Spanish troops and to get them out of the country.
They were put there by Philip for the one and only purpose of crushing
independence and stamping on Protestantism. Orange found that an
Inquisition had been decided upon, more terrible than anything that had
gone before.
We have seen that already under Philip’s father the Netherlands had
been treated with great cruelty, and the Papal Inquisition had been
used to put a stop to Lutheranism. The spirit of the great Reformer had
taken a firm hold in this country, and Luther’s work, combined with the
work of Calvin in France, had made the country keenly Protestant and
determined to resist any sort of Catholic domination. The Netherlands
character itself was marked by one great quality which, in the words
of the historian Motley, was “the love of liberty and the instinct of
self-government.” The country was composed of brave and hardy races who
for centuries had been fighting for their liberty against great odds.
Divided as their country was into provinces, they had had no king of
their own, but had been governed by feudal lords and treated as slaves
and dependents, with no power or voice in their own government. From
this wretched position they emerged by their own efforts. By their
great industry and character they made themselves rich and powerful,
and, forming themselves in the cities into trade guilds and leagues,
they fought against, and in many cases turned out, the feudal lords,
governing themselves by their own laws and choosing their own governors
from among themselves. Seeing their great wealth and prosperity,
neighboring countries were desirous of adding these riches to their
own territories, and thus, through war and purchase, the Netherlands
fell under the dominion of Burgundy with its powerful reigning dukes,
and under Austria through further wars, and finally, by a marriage of
a Prince of Burgundy with a Princess of Spain, they became subjects of
the latter country.
Charles V was the first King of Spain and the Netherlands, and with
his rule the worst of their trials began. Under the Burgundian dukes
the people of the Netherlands had managed to retain self-government,
firmly clinging to their liberties, and at no price would they
consent to become a province of Spain. No two peoples could have
been more opposite in character—Spain quite behind the age, bigoted,
superstitious, violently Catholic, cruel and aristocratic; and the
Netherlands, full of life and activity, the rival of Italy in art and
learning, ready to go ahead and adopt all the advanced and enlightened
thought of the Reformation. In trade they had no rivals, for they were
the busiest manufacturers in the world. Their stuffs were celebrated
everywhere, and their ships visited all the ports in the world. This
happy, brave little people were to be crushed and persecuted for their
valor. But they were to find a deliverer—a leader who was to be the
source of their inspiration and courage in the awful days to come—one
who was willing, though he could gain nothing by it, to throw in his
lot with theirs, to suffer and endure the same as they.
Orange had not much sympathy with the Reformers. He was an aristocrat
and a Catholic, and had never thought of being anything but completely
loyal to kings—after all he was one of them: he had what is considered
the privilege of addressing crowned heads as “cousin.” But his sense of
justice was one of the strongest things in his character, and he was
quite determined to protect the harmless multitudes in the Netherlands
from the horrible punishments and deaths which were in store for them,
and these people were all his inferiors by birth—what are termed “the
masses.” Dyers, tanners, and trades-people were the only Protestants
in those days, so it was a more tremendous thing than one thinks for
an aristocrat to take up the cause of the people as Orange was about
to do. It is generally some remarkable man among the people who fights
for justice for his own class, and it was, as I have said, the more
wonderful for William to have taken up the cause of the people as his
sympathy did not come from his agreement with them on religion, but
purely from his manly, just, and generous disposition.
At this time in his twenty-seventh year, William was very rich,
prosperous, and powerful. Few perhaps realized that there lay within
him the seeds of future greatness. But though he had a thoughtful and
an intellectual nature, he also had a pleasure-loving, easygoing
nature, and nothing could exceed the luxury and magnificence of the
life he led in his great palace at Brussels. It was a life full of
color, variety, and amusement, with masquerades, banquets, chases, and
tourneys from morning till night. Twenty-four noblemen and eighteen
pages of gentle birth served in his household. One day, in order to
economize, Orange dismissed twenty-eight cooks! Princely houses in
Germany sent their cooks to learn in his kitchen, so celebrated was
the excellence of his dishes. He kept, as princes and noblemen did in
those days, open house, but he did not keep his money. A contemporary
historian—a Catholic and an opponent—describes him at this time:
Never did arrogant or indiscreet word issue from his mouth under the
impulse of anger or other passion. If any of his servants committed a
fault, he was satisfied to admonish them gently, without resorting to
menace or to abusive language. He was master of a sweet and winning
power of persuasion, by means of which he gave form to the great
ideas within him, and thus he succeeded in bending to his will the
other lords about the court as he chose, beloved and in high favour
above all men with the people by reason of a gracious manner that he
had of saluting and addressing in a fascinating and familiar way all
whom he met.
Orange had become a widower at twenty-five, but two years later he
married again; his bride was Anne of Saxony, the daughter of a great
German Lutheran magnate. The marriage met with great opposition from
the Catholics, and this seemed to make Orange only more determined.
There was nothing to recommend Anne except her wealth and lands. She
was lame and had no charm, and became later an odious and impossible
woman who made her husband very unhappy.
King Philip meanwhile continued to shower honors upon Orange. He made
him a Councilor of State and Stadtholder or Governor of Holland,
Zeeland, and Utrecht, and head of the troops in those provinces. If
Orange had been content to do as he was told, his prosperous, pleasant
life might have continued. Fortune from his birth had smiled upon him,
and everything that the heart of man could desire seemed to lie within
the hollow of his hand. But at the risk of losing everything—his high
honors and worldly position—he was to speak and to act as his heart and
conscience told him to, which was in direct opposition to the King and
to his own material welfare. From this time onwards Orange, in a quiet,
determined way, resisted Philip and his commands. His resistance was so
far guarded, as he could not as yet defy him openly. His first step by
way of protecting the Netherlanders was to use his position to persuade
some powerful members of the States General (a form of Parliament,)
to refuse supplies unless the Spanish troops were removed. Philip had
given Orange the names of “several excellent persons” suspected of
the New Religion and commanded Orange to put them to death. Orange
not only did not do this, but gave them warning so that they might
escape. Philip now issued an edict that no one should read or copy any
of the writings of Luther or Calvin, or discuss any doubtful matters
in the Scriptures, or break images, on pain of death by fire, or by
being beheaded or buried alive if a woman. The troops were to be there
to enforce the edicts. He made more bishoprics in the Netherlands in
order that the ruffian bishops might spy and pry and assist in finding
heretics. The principal ruffian was one Granvelle, on whom the Pope
conferred the title of cardinal.
Philip himself left the Netherlands for Spain, and made his
half-sister, Margaret of Parma, Regent. She was thirty-seven and an
ardent Catholic. Her recommendation to Philip was that she felt greater
horror for heretics than for any other form of evil-doer. She was not
particularly clever, but she had learnt to dissimulate—in other words,
to tell stories—and never to give a direct answer to a question. She
looked mannish, having a mustache, and she suffered from gout. This
gave the impression that she was masterful and like a man, which she
was not at all.
It was not long before Philip discovered that Orange was not seeing eye
to eye with him. He found out that, as commander of the Spanish troops,
he was using his position to check persecution. Philip therefore ceased
to admit him and Count Egmont, another suspect, to the inner councils.
But he was not willing to get rid of Orange or to drive him into
rebellion. He knew his power, and the service he could still render,
and he realized the great anger it would cause in the Netherlands were
William to be dismissed. When the persecution under Granvelle and the
enormities committed by the Spanish troops on innocent people became
too much for Orange to bear without open protest, Philip, fearing a
general revolt, undertook to do what Orange asked him. He dismissed
the troops temporarily, and the Cardinal retired into Spain to hatch
more horrible plots, especially against Orange, whom he hated more than
any one in the world. Orange had threatened to resign if he remained.
In doing this he was not in a temper; that was not his way, for he
scarcely ever lost his head. When he addressed himself to Philip with
these requests, he faced the consequences. He knew that he would almost
certainly incur the everlasting anger of the King.
The country having a moment’s respite from Granvelle, Orange now set
himself to obtain three things:
1. A regular meeting of the States General (or Parliament).
2. The organization of a real, single, and efficient Council of State
that should be the supreme source of government.
3. A relaxation of the persecution of heresy.
He worked ceaselessly amongst the nobles trying to get their powerful
aid on the side of the people and the Protestant Revolution, persuading
Count Egmont, one of the foremost and most powerful of the Flemish
noblemen, to go on a mission to Philip in Spain to beg him to relax his
persecutions.
William of Orange’s younger brother, Louis, had also taken up the cause
of the Reformers in a whole-hearted and enthusiastic spirit. He had
the advantage over his brother of being an avowed anti-Catholic, and
being perfectly free and fearless, he was able to do the most useful
work in the way of propaganda and in inspiring resistance to the
Catholics. He gathered together several violent and reckless young men,
young aristocrats of spirit but of bad reputation, and he gave these
young wastrels something to think about, something to work and to live
for. Under his leadership they held meetings, and formed themselves
into a League of Protest against the Inquisition, drawing up, as a
result of their meetings, a petition to the Regent, Margaret of Parma,
entitled _The Request_. But the writing of it was in such violent
language—though perfectly justifiable in the circumstances—that
Orange, who was more of a statesman than his brother, could not advise
the Regent to accept it. He believed it would do more harm than good.
But finally it was put into humbler and more polite language, and being
signed by two hundred nobles and burghers in Holland, it was presented
to the Regent. She was upset, and tried to get out of giving them any
answer to their requests. She assured them she would ask the King. One
of her court turned to her saying, “Is Your Highness to be terrorized
by these beggars?” and hereafter the Leaguers took upon themselves this
title, and went about in beggars’ garb of loose grey frieze, a terror
to the Catholics and a great force, as their numbers increased, in the
coming Revolution.
The position of Orange at this time, trying as he was to keep loyal to
the King and yet to protect the people against him, was becoming more
and more difficult to himself. At thirty, Orange was a very different
man from what he had been at twenty-six. He had much changed, and was
no longer the prosperous and brilliant grandee of those times, but worn
and thin and sad. He could not sleep. His position was an impossible
one. He could not yet be quite openly against the Catholics; he saw
no prospect at present of throwing off the Spanish yoke, and he was
not yet prepared for rebellion. He hated what we call propaganda, and
the narrowness of the Calvinists. He was charged with treason on one
side—the Spanish rulers regarded him as a rebel—and on the other he
was looked upon by the Beggars as a lukewarm friend. He was between
the devil and the deep sea, desperate and puzzled and seeing no way
out. But this state of things did not last long. The excesses of
the Spaniards were fast exasperating the Netherlanders. There were
constant small outbreaks of rebellion, and finally a great riot of
image-breaking in Antwerp. The troops were all recalled, and Orange was
commanded to put down the rebels, to quell and to destroy them by the
most extreme methods. Tumult, confusion, and outrage were everywhere,
and as Orange refused to punish in the way he was requested, his
command was brought to an end.
The Regent, through the advice of her brother, challenged him to
take the oath “to serve His Majesty, and to act toward and against
all and every as shall be ordered on his behalf, without limitation
or restriction.” The Prince refused. He might, he said, be asked to
kill his own wife. The Regent, still recognizing Orange’s power and
qualities, and always hoping to get him on her side, begged him to
remain with her and retain his offices. She pressed him to meet Egmont
and other influential Flemish magnates to discuss the situation. Orange
consented to this, and, seeing Egmont, begged him not to wait and
become a party to the frightful holocaust of blood which was about to
swamp the Netherlands. Egmont refused, partly out of loyalty to the
sovereign and partly out of weakness. Orange, in taking farewell of
him, embraced him and was convinced he would never see him again. He
never did, for Egmont was, a little later, taken and put to death by
the Catholics as a traitor.
This must have been the moment when Orange ceased to have any sympathy
with the Catholic Church. But he so far had not joined any other
sect, and had apparently no sympathy with the Calvinism which he was
afterwards to embrace. He retired now to his palace at Brussels and
gave up all his offices. Philip wrote him sham letters of regret while,
secretly, he advised Alva to seize Orange and bring him to punishment.
They had made their plans, and Orange was then formally outlawed as a
rebel, and his eldest son, who was at the University, seized and taken
to Spain—his father never saw him again. Orange left Brussels as an
outlaw, retiring to his brother’s castle of Dillenburg, where he lived
with his mother. Alva then arrived in Brussels at the head of a Spanish
army, one of the most splendid ever seen—healthy, well-trained, and
courageous. The outbursts of revolt had filled Philip and Granvelle
with a perfect fury of vengeance; there in the depths of Spain they had
been planning and hatching horrible plots together, and now they set to
and worked the Inquisition for all it was worth. The head Inquisitor,
Piter Titelman, with his underlings, would scour the country, rushing
into people’s houses, dragging out so-called heretics, accusing them,
and hanging or burning them without any evidence whatever.
What was the result? The more these fine people of the Netherlands were
trampled on, the stronger their spirit of resistance grew. Orange set
himself to raise and organize troops to protect them from Alva. He got
together some French Huguenots and Flemish refugees, but he was doomed
for the present to failure. He had not realized the strength of Alva as
a general and of his magnificently organized troops. Only the valiant
Louis, his brother, managed by extreme dash and courage to win one
victory. Orange struggled on, in spite of reverses. “With God’s help,”
he writes to his brother, “I am determined to go on”; but through lack
of funds he had to disband his mercenaries, or paid soldiers, and
retire again to Dillenburg. This was perhaps the most unhappy period
of Orange’s life. He was outlawed and almost a beggar, for he had
sold all he possessed—his jewels, his plate, and his lands; his wife
was showing signs of losing her mind, and instead of being a comfort
to her husband, she hurled abuse and cruel and unjust accusations at
him, blaming him for all their misfortunes and giving him no comfort
whatever. Only his wonderful mother stood by him and showed her
strength and understanding until she died.
Still Orange, with his fortunes at their lowest ebb, did not lose
heart or hope. He was lonely and abandoned, indeed, by most people;
his resources seem to have come to an end; still he continued to
make plans for saving his country. Every nerve he strained to get
support for his cause. Day and night he worked—sending messengers to
France and England to beg support and money for troops. He was finally
supplied with eighteen vessels, and, looking back on the course of
the struggle, this seems to have been the turning-point in the future
of the Netherlands. They were to suffer still untold misfortunes,
but from the moment that the struggle was carried on by sea, so, in
proportion, the Spaniards ceased to tell. “The Beggars of the Sea,” as
they now termed themselves, were an adventurous and fearless band. They
had several successes, and seized the town of Brill and some smaller
places. The revolt, gaining courage, spread like fire through Holland
and Zeeland, Utrecht and Friesland; all the principal towns of these
provinces hailed Orange as their leader and submitted themselves to his
authority. Louis of Nassau dashed into France and seized Valenciennes
and Mons. Orange himself was nearly taken by the Spaniards in a
surprise night attack. They came to his camp when he was asleep with
all his clothes on, as his habit was then, his arms beside him, and his
horse saddled; but he was awakened by his favorite lapdog, which lay on
his couch. So, in the statues of the Prince in Delft and The Hague, the
little dog lies at his feet in bronze.
A terrible event now crushed Orange and temporarily set back the cause
of Protestantism and freedom. This was the Massacre of St. Bartholomew
in Paris, when Coligny, the leader of the Huguenots—the French
Protestants—who had promised to come to the assistance of Orange, was
murdered by the Catholics.
Orange went to live in Delft, which became his home. He had made up
his mind to cast his lot for good and all with the Hollanders and
Zeelanders in their struggle for freedom. There in their midst he
continued to inspire their spirit of resistance and independence.
His was the moving spirit which helped the Dutch gradually by their
extraordinary endurance to wear down the Spanish armies. It was his
spirit, too, that kept the Spanish at bay at the celebrated siege
of Haarlem, when for seven months the inhabitants endured terrible
sufferings—the women fighting for their lives as well as the men—until
they were starved out. The relief of Leyden was effected by Orange’s
own personal exertions, though ill with fever.
In 1573 Orange became a Calvinist, so as to identify himself more
completely with the cause he had at heart. But he was not a bigoted
Calvinist any more than he had been a devoted Catholic. He had always
been ready to respect the good side of every religion. He never could
understand why people should not live happily together, praying in
their own way. The spirit of Religion appealed to him, not the letter
or the doctrine. He would have been content to remain a Catholic, had
it not been for the Church’s persecutions.
Now, his wife, Anne of Saxony, having left him and become insane,
Orange married again for the third time—Charlotte of Bourbon, who had
been a nun. This gave further offense to the Catholics.
The years 1576–78 were almost the most crowded, the most desperate, and
yet the most triumphant of William’s life. He was, he writes to his
brother, overwhelmed with work and grief and care. The terrible Spanish
army, storming the cities of the Netherlands and butchering their
inhabitants, seemed to have got the best of it. Many towns fell to
them, and Orange at one moment felt at the end of his tether, when the
fortunate occurrence of a mutiny for pay in the Spanish army and the
death of its Grand Commander gave Orange his opportunity. While Philip
hesitated, Orange acted. This brought about the union of Holland and
Zeeland, which is known as the Union of Delft, a crucial act and the
foundation of a great Power to come. Orange was given supreme authority
as ruler. He was to support the Reformed Religion, but no inquisition
was to be allowed into any man’s faith or conscience. For not only had
Orange to fight the Catholics, but he had to hold back the Calvinists,
who, immediately their power and numbers increased, revenged themselves
most horribly on those of different creeds. The horrors of the Spanish
Fury continued to increase. William called a conference of the States
General and drew up the Pacification of Ghent. By this treaty all the
seventeen provinces bound themselves into a solemn league to expel
the Spaniards, and made it law that the ultimate settlement of all
questions was to rest with the States General.
William’s appeals to the people of the Netherlands were masterpieces of
eloquence and reason. He put it that disunion had been their ruin—union
would save them. A stick is, he said, easily broken; a faggot of sticks
bound together resists. He appealed not only to Protestants but to
Catholics, asking them not to be taken in by the superstitious idea
that loyalty means absolutely cringing to the every wish of a king,
who is probably of all the people the most ignorant as to all that is
being done in his name. The States were stirred by his appeals, and
the Pacification was hailed with shouts of joy and relief. Orange at
this moment reached the height of his career, and he was persuaded by
his people to make a public entry into Brussels as their acknowledged
leader. He received a tremendously enthusiastic and brilliant
welcome. A little later, however, he had to suffer disappointment
in the breaking away of the Southern from the Northern Netherlands.
The persecution in the South had done its work and Philip gained the
allegiance of Belgium. Henceforward they had separate histories and are
known as Holland and Belgium. In his further struggles against Philip,
Orange felt scarcely strong enough to hold his United Provinces without
assistance from another country. He turned to France, offering to make
the Duc d’Anjou, brother of the French King, sovereign of the United
Provinces. His offer was accepted. The Duke proved to be a weak and
treacherous man; he was a complete failure, and, making himself odious
and impossible to his subjects, his rule was brought to an end.
The awful Granvelle had meanwhile whispered to Philip that they might
assassinate Orange (1580), and they finally drew up together a ban
putting a price upon the Prince’s head. They declared him a traitor and
as such banished him “perpetually from our realms.”
Orange, living quietly with his wife at Delft, took it very calmly. He
showed no fear; the Lord, he said, would dispose as He thought fit. But
he wrote and published his famous _Apology_, a very lengthy document
which is interesting as a history of his life. In it he answers the
accusations brought against him in the ban—that he is a foreigner, a
heretic, an enemy, a rebel, and so on.