CHAPTER I.

Produced by David Widger

MOTLEY'S HISTORY OF THE NETHERLANDS, PG EDITION

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

A History

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 United

States Minister to England, 1869-70. Mark Twain mentions his respect for

John Motley. Oliver Wendell Holmes said in 'An Oration delivered before

the City Authorities of Boston' on the 4th of July, 1863: "'It cannot be

denied,'--says another observer, placed on one of our national

watch-towers in a foreign capital,--'it cannot be denied that the

tendency of European public opinion, as delivered from high places, is

more and more unfriendly to our cause; but the people,' he adds,

'everywhere sympathize with us, for they know that our cause is that of

free institutions,--that our struggle is that of the people against an

oligarchy.' These are the words of the Minister to Austria, whose

generous sympathies with popular liberty no homage paid to his genius by

the class whose admiring welcome is most seductive to scholars has ever

spoiled; our fellow-citizen, the historian of a great Republic which

infused a portion of its life into our own,--John Lothrop Motley." (See

the biography of Motley, by Holmes) Ed.]

PREFACE

The rise of the Dutch Republic must ever be regarded as one of the

leading events of modern times. Without the birth of this great

commonwealth, the various historical phenomena of: the sixteenth and

following centuries must have either not existed; or have presented

themselves under essential modifications.--Itself an organized protest

against ecclesiastical tyranny and universal empire, the Republic guarded

with sagacity, at many critical periods in the world's history; that

balance of power which, among civilized states; ought always to be

identical with the scales of divine justice. The splendid empire of

Charles the Fifth was erected upon the grave of liberty. It is a

consolation to those who have hope in humanity to watch, under the reign

of his successor, the gradual but triumphant resurrection of the spirit

over which the sepulchre had so long been sealed. From the handbreadth of

territory called the province of Holland rises a power which wages eighty

years' warfare with the most potent empire upon earth, and which, during

the progress of the struggle, becoming itself a mighty state, and binding

about its own slender form a zone of the richest possessions of earth,

from pole to tropic, finally dictates its decrees to the empire of

Charles.

So much is each individual state but a member of one great international

commonwealth, and so close is the relationship between the whole human

family, that it is impossible for a nation, even while struggling for

itself, not to acquire something for all mankind. The maintenance of the

right by the little provinces of Holland and Zealand in the sixteenth, by

Holland and England united in the seventeenth, and by the United States

of America in the eighteenth centuries, forms but a single chapter in the

great 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, is

the world indebted for practical instruction in that great science of

political equilibrium which must always become more and more important as

the various states of the civilized world are pressed more closely

together, and as the struggle for pre-eminence becomes more feverish and

fatal. Courage and skill in political and military combinations enabled

William the Silent to overcome the most powerful and unscrupulous monarch

of his age. The same hereditary audacity and fertility of genius placed

the destiny of Europe in the hands of William's great-grandson, and

enabled him to mould into an impregnable barrier the various elements of

opposition to the overshadowing monarchy of Louis XIV. As the schemes of

the Inquisition and the unparalleled tyranny of Philip, in one century,

led to the establishment of the Republic of the United Provinces, so, in

the next, the revocation of the Nantes Edict and the invasion of Holland

are avenged by the elevation of the Dutch stadholder upon the throne of

the stipendiary Stuarts.

To all who speak the English language; the history of the great agony

through which the Republic of Holland was ushered into life must have

peculiar interest, for it is a portion of the records of the Anglo-Saxon

race--essentially the same, whether in Friesland, England, or

Massachusetts.

A great naval and commercial commonwealth, occupying a small portion of

Europe but conquering a wide empire by the private enterprise of trading

companies, girdling the world with its innumerable dependencies in Asia,

America, Africa, Australia--exercising sovereignty in Brazil, Guiana, the

West Indies, New York, at the Cape of Good Hope, in Hindostan, Ceylon,

Java, Sumatra, New Holland--having first laid together, as it were, many

of the Cyclopean blocks, out of which the British realm, at a late:

period, has been constructed--must always be looked upon with interest by

Englishmen, as in a great measure the precursor in their own scheme of

empire.

For America the spectacle is one of still deeper import. The Dutch

Republic originated in the opposition of the rational elements of human

nature to sacerdotal dogmatism and persecution--in the courageous

resistance of historical and chartered liberty to foreign despotism.

Neither that liberty nor ours was born of the cloud-embraces of a false

Divinity with, a Humanity of impossible beauty, nor was the infant career

of either arrested in blood and tears by the madness of its worshippers.

"To maintain," not to overthrow, was the device of the Washington of the

sixteenth century, as it was the aim of our own hero and his great

contemporaries.

The great Western Republic, therefore--in whose Anglo-Saxon veins flows

much of that ancient and kindred blood received from the nation once

ruling a noble portion of its territory, and tracking its own political

existence to the same parent spring of temperate human liberty--must look

with affectionate interest upon the trials of the elder commonwealth.

These volumes recite the achievement of Dutch independence, for its

recognition was delayed till the acknowledgment was superfluous and

ridiculous. The existence of the Republic is properly to be dated from

the Union of Utrecht in 1581, while the final separation of territory

into independent and obedient provinces, into the Commonwealth of the

United States and the Belgian provinces of Spain, was in reality effected

by William the Silent, with whose death three years subsequently, the

heroic period of the history may be said to terminate. At this point

these volumes close. Another series, with less attention to minute

details, and carrying the story through a longer range of years, will

paint the progress of the Republic in its palmy days, and narrate the

establishment of, its external system of dependencies and its interior

combinations for self-government and European counterpoise. The lessons

of history and the fate of free states can never be sufficiently pondered

by those upon whom so large and heavy a responsibility for the

maintenance of rational human freedom rests.

I have only to add that this work is the result of conscientious

research, and of an earnest desire to arrive at the truth. I have

faithfully studied all the important contemporary chroniclers and later

historians--Dutch, Flemish, French, Italian, Spanish, or German. Catholic

and Protestant, Monarchist and Republican, have been consulted with the

same sincerity. The works of Bor (whose enormous but indispensable folios

form a complete magazine of contemporary state-papers, letters, and

pamphlets, blended together in mass, and connected by a chain of artless

but 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 as

familiar to me as those of Mendoza, Carnero, Cabrera, Herrera, Ulloa,

Bentivoglio, Peres, Strada. The manuscript relations of those Argus-eyed

Venetian envoys who surprised so many courts and cabinets in their most

unguarded moments, and daguerreotyped their character and policy for the

instruction of the crafty Republic, and whose reports remain such an

inestimable source for the secret history of the sixteenth century, have

been carefully examined--especially the narratives of the caustic and

accomplished Badovaro, of Suriano, and Michele. It is unnecessary to add

that all the publications of M. Gachard--particularly the invaluable

correspondence of Philip II. and of William the Silent, as well as the

"Archives et Correspondence" of the Orange Nassau family, edited by the

learned and distinguished Groen van Prinsterer, have been my constant

guides through the tortuous labyrinth of Spanish and Netherland politics.

The large and most interesting series of pamphlets known as "The Duncan

Collection," in the Royal Library at the Hague, has also afforded a great

variety of details by which I have endeavoured to give color and interest

to the narrative. Besides these, and many other printed works, I have

also had the advantage of perusing many manuscript histories, among which

may be particularly mentioned the works of Pontua Payen, of Renom de

France, and of Pasquier de la Barre; while the vast collection of

unpublished documents in the Royal Archives of the Hague, of Brussels,

and of Dresden, has furnished me with much new matter of great

importance. I venture to hope that many years of labour, a portion of

them in the archives of those countries whose history forms the object of

my study, will not have been entirely in vain; and that the lovers of

human progress, the believers in the capacity of nations for

self-government and self-improvement, and the admirers of disinterested

human genius and virtue, may find encouragement for their views in the

detailed history of an heroic people in its most eventful period, and in

the life and death of the great man whose name and fame are identical

with those of his country.

No apology is offered for this somewhat personal statement. When an

unknown writer asks the attention of the public upon an important theme,

he is not only authorized, but required, to show, that by industry and

earnestness he has entitled himself to a hearing. The author too keenly

feels that he has no further claims than these, and he therefore most

diffidently 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 the

courtesy and kindness extended to me so uniformly during the course of my

researches in that city. I would also speak a word of sincere thanks to

Mr. Campbell, Assistant Librarian at the Hague, for his numerous acts of

friendship during the absence of, his chief, M. Holtrop. To that most

distinguished critic and historian, M. Bakhuyzen van den Brinck, Chief

Archivist of the Netherlands, I am under deep obligations for advice,

instruction, and constant kindness, during my residence at the Hague; and

I would also signify my sense of the courtesy of Mr. Charter-Master de

Schwane, and of the accuracy with which copies of MSS. in the archives

were prepared for me by his care. Finally, I would allude in the

strongest language of gratitude and respect to M. Gachard,

Archivist-General of Belgium, for his unwearied courtesy and manifold

acts of kindness to me during my studies in the Royal Archives of

Brussels.

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION.

Part 1.

I.

The north-western corner of the vast plain which extends from the German

ocean to the Ural mountains, is occupied by the countries called the

Netherlands. This small triangle, enclosed between France, Germany, and

the sea, is divided by the modern kingdoms of Belgium and Holland into

two nearly equal portions. Our earliest information concerning this

territory is derived from the Romans. The wars waged by that nation with

the northern barbarians have rescued the damp island of Batavia, with its

neighboring morasses, from the obscurity in which they might have

remained for ages, before any thing concerning land or people would have

been made known by the native inhabitants. Julius Caesar has saved from,

oblivion the heroic savages who fought against his legions in defence of

their dismal homes with ferocious but unfortunate patriotism; and the

great poet of England, learning from the conqueror's Commentaries the

name of the boldest tribe, has kept the Nervii, after almost twenty

centuries, still fresh and familiar in our ears.

Tacitus, too, has described with singular minuteness the struggle between

the people of these regions and the power of Rome, overwhelming, although

tottering to its fall; and has moreover, devoted several chapters of his

work upon Germany to a description of the most remarkable Teutonic tribes

of the Netherlands.

Geographically and ethnographically, the Low Countries belong both to

Gaul and to Germany. It is even doubtful to which of the two the Batavian

island, which is the core of the whole country, was reckoned by the

Romans. It is, however, most probable that all the land, with the

exception of Friesland, was considered a part of Gaul.

Three great rivers--the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheld--had deposited

their slime for ages among the dunes and sand banks heaved up by the

ocean around their mouths. A delta was thus formed, habitable at last for

man. It was by nature a wide morass, in which oozy islands and savage

forests were interspersed among lagoons and shallows; a district lying

partly below the level of the ocean at its higher tides, subject to

constant overflow from the rivers, and to frequent and terrible

inundations by the sea.

The Rhine, leaving at last the regions where its storied lapse, through

so many ages, has been consecrated alike by nature and art-by poetry and

eventful truth--flows reluctantly through the basalt portal of the

Seven Mountains into the open fields which extend to the German sea.

After entering this vast meadow, the stream divides itself into two

branches, becoming thus the two-horned Rhine of Virgil, and holds in

these two arms the island of Batavia.

The Meuse, taking its rise in the Vosges, pours itself through the

Ardennes wood, pierces the rocky ridges upon the southeastern frontier of

the Low Countries, receives the Sambre in the midst of that picturesque

anthracite basin where now stands the city of Namur, and then moves

toward the north, through nearly the whole length of the country, till it

mingles its waters with the Rhine.

The Scheld, almost exclusively a Belgian river, after leaving its

fountains in Picardy, flows through the present provinces of Flanders and

Hainault. In Caesar's time it was suffocated before reaching the sea in

quicksands and thickets, which long afforded protection to the savage

inhabitants against the Roman arms; and which the slow process of nature

and the untiring industry of man have since converted into the

archipelago of Zealand and South Holland. These islands were unknown to

the Romans.

Such were the rivers, which, with their numerous tributaries, coursed

through the spongy land. Their frequent overflow, when forced back upon

their currents by the stormy sea, rendered the country almost

uninhabitable. Here, within a half-submerged territory, a race of

wretched ichthyophagi dwelt upon terpen, or mounds, which they had

raised, like beavers, above the almost fluid soil. Here, at a later day,

the same race chained the tyrant Ocean and his mighty streams into

subserviency, forcing them to fertilize, to render commodious, to cover

with a beneficent network of veins and arteries, and to bind by watery

highways with the furthest ends of the world, a country disinherited by

nature of its rights. A region, outcast of ocean and earth, wrested at

last from both domains their richest treasures. A race, engaged for

generations in stubborn conflict with the angry elements, was

unconsciously educating itself for its great struggle with the still more

savage despotism of man.

The whole territory of the Netherlands was girt with forests. An

extensive belt of woodland skirted the sea-coast; reaching beyond the

mouths of the Rhine. Along the outer edge of this carrier, the dunes cast

up by the sea were prevented by the close tangle of thickets from

drifting further inward; and thus formed a breastwork which time and art

were to strengthen. The groves of Haarlem and the Hague are relics of

this ancient forest. The Badahuenna wood, horrid with Druidic sacrifices,

extended along the eastern line of the vanished lake of Flevo. The vast

Hercynian forest, nine days' journey in breadth, closed in the country on

the German side, stretching from the banks of the Rhine to the remote

regions of the Dacians, in such vague immensity (says the conqueror of

the whole country) that no German, after traveling sixty days, had ever

reached, or even heard of; its commencement. On the south, the famous

groves of Ardennes, haunted by faun and satyr, embowered the country, and

separated 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-accomplished

Roman. Yet foreign tyranny, from the earliest ages, has coveted this

meagre territory as lustfully as it has sought to wrest from their native

possessors those lands with the fatal gift of beauty for their dower;

while the genius of liberty has inspired as noble a resistance to

oppression here as it ever aroused in Grecian or Italian breasts.

II.

It can never be satisfactorily ascertained who were the aboriginal

inhabitants. The record does not reach beyond Caesar's epoch, and he

found the territory on the left of the Rhine mainly tenanted by tribes of

the Celtic family. That large division of the Indo-European group which

had already overspread many portions of Asia Minor, Greece, Germany, the

British Islands, France, and Spain, had been long settled in Belgic Gaul,

and constituted the bulk of its population. Checked in its westward

movement by the Atlantic, its current began to flow backwards towards its

fountains, so that the Gallic portion of the Netherland population was

derived from the original race in its earlier wanderings and from the

later and refluent tide coming out of Celtic Gaul. The modern appellation

of the Walloons points to the affinity of their ancestors with the

Gallic, Welsh, and Gaelic family. The Belgae were in many respects a

superior race to most of their blood-allies. They were, according to

Caesar's testimony, the bravest of all the Celts. This may be in part

attributed to the presence of several German tribes, who, at this period

had already forced their way across the Rhine, mingled their qualities

with the Belgic material, and lent an additional mettle to the Celtic

blood. The heart of the country was thus inhabited by a Gallic race, but

the 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 the

Rhine island of Batavia, who were probably Celts, joined in the

expedition. A recent and tremendous inundation had swept away their

miserable homes, and even the trees of the forests, and had thus rendered

them still more dissatisfied with their gloomy abodes. The island was

deserted of its population. At about the same period a civil dissension

among the Chatti--a powerful German race within the Hercynian

forest--resulted in the expatriation of a portion of the people. The

exiles sought a new home in the empty Rhine island, called it "Bet-auw,"

or "good-meadow," and were themselves called, thenceforward, Batavi, or

Batavians.

These Batavians, according to Tacitus, were the bravest of all the

Germans. The Chatti, of whom they formed a portion, were a pre-eminently

warlike race. "Others go to battle," says the historian, "these go to

war." Their bodies were more hardy, their minds more vigorous, than those

of other tribes. Their young men cut neither hair nor beard till they had

slain an enemy. On the field of battle, in the midst of carnage and

plunder, they, for the first time, bared their faces. The cowardly and

sluggish, only, remained unshorn. They wore an iron ring, too, or shackle

upon their necks until they had performed the same achievement, a symbol

which they then threw away, as the emblem of sloth. The Batavians were

ever spoken of by the Romans with entire respect. They conquered the

Belgians, they forced the free Frisians to pay tribute, but they called

the Batavians their friends. The tax-gatherer never invaded their island.

Honorable alliance united them with the Romans. It was, however, the

alliance of the giant and the dwarf. The Roman gained glory and empire,

the Batavian gained nothing but the hardest blows. The Batavian cavalry

became famous throughout the Republic and the Empire. They were the

favorite troops of Caesar, and with reason, for it was their valor which

turned the tide of battle at Pharsalia. From the death of Julius down to

the 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 the

Dollart, both caused by the terrific inundations of the thirteenth

century and not existing at this period, did not then interpose

boundaries between kindred tribes. All formed a homogeneous nation of

pure German origin.

Thus, the population of the country was partly Celtic, partly German. Of

these two elements, dissimilar in their tendencies and always difficult

to blend, the Netherland people has ever been compounded. A certain

fatality of history has perpetually helped to separate still more widely

these constituents, instead of detecting and stimulating the elective

affinities which existed. Religion, too, upon all great historical

occasions, has acted as the most powerful of dissolvents. Otherwise, had

so many valuable and contrasted characteristics been early fused into a

whole, it would be difficult to show a race more richly endowed by Nature

for 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. The

German excited astonishment by his huge body and muscular limbs. Both

were fair, with fierce blue eyes, but the Celt had yellow hair floating

over his shoulders, and the German long locks of fiery red, which he even

dyed with woad to heighten the favorite color, and wore twisted into a

war-knot upon the top of his head. Here the German's love of finery

ceased. A simple tunic fastened at his throat with a thorn, while his

other garments defined and gave full play to his limbs, completed his

costume. The Gaul, on the contrary, was so fond of dress that the Romans

divided his race respectively into long-haired, breeched, and gowned

Gaul; (Gallia comata, braccata, togata). He was fond of brilliant and

parti-colored clothes, a taste which survives in the Highlander's

costume. He covered his neck and arms with golden chains. The simple and

ferocious German wore no decoration save his iron ring, from which his

first homicide relieved him. The Gaul was irascible, furious in his

wrath, but less formidable in a sustained conflict with a powerful foe.

"All the Gauls are of very high stature," says a soldier who fought under

Julian. (Amm. Marcel. xv. 12. 1). "They are white, golden-haired,

terrible in the fierceness of their eyes, greedy of quarrels, bragging

and insolent. A band of strangers could not resist one of them in a

brawl, assisted by his strong blue-eyed wife, especially when she begins,

gnashing her teeth, her neck swollen, brandishing her vast and snowy

arms, and kicking with her heels at the same time, to deliver her

fisticuffs, like bolts from the twisted strings of a catapult. The voices

of many are threatening and formidable. They are quick to anger, but

quickly appeased. All are clean in their persons; nor among them is ever

seen any man or woman, as elsewhere, squalid in ragged garments. At all

ages they are apt for military service. The old man goes forth to the

fight with equal strength of breast, with limbs as hardened by cold and

assiduous labor, and as contemptuous of all dangers, as the young. Not

one of them, as in Italy is often the case, was ever known to cut off his

thumbs to avoid the service of Mars."

The polity of each race differed widely from that of the other. The

government of both may be said to have been republican, but the Gallic

tribes were aristocracies, in which the influence of clanship was a

predominant feature; while the German system, although nominally regal,

was in reality democratic. In Gaul were two orders, the nobility and the

priesthood, while the people, says Caesar, were all slaves. The knights

or nobles were all trained to arms. Each went forth to battle, followed

by his dependents, while a chief of all the clans was appointed to take

command during the war. The prince or chief governor was elected

annually, but only by the nobles. The people had no rights at all, and

were glad to assign themselves as slaves to any noble who was strong

enough to protect them. In peace the Druids exercised the main functions

of government. They decided all controversies, civil and criminal. To

rebel against their decrees was punished by exclusion from the

sacrifices--a most terrible excommunication, through which the criminal

was cut off from all intercourse with his fellow-creatures.

With the Germans, the sovereignty resided in the great assembly of the

people. There were slaves, indeed, but in small number, consisting either

of prisoners of war or of those unfortunates who had gambled away their

liberty in games of chance. Their chieftains, although called by the

Romans princes and kings, were, in reality, generals, chosen by universal

suffrage. Elected in the great assembly to preside in war, they were

raised on the shoulders of martial freemen, amid wild battle cries and

the clash of spear and shield. The army consisted entirely of volunteers,

and the soldier was for life infamous who deserted the field while his

chief remained alive. The same great assembly elected the village

magistrates and decided upon all important matters both of peace and war.

At the full of the moon it was usually convoked. The nobles and the

popular delegates arrived at irregular intervals, for it was an

inconvenience arising from their liberty, that two or three days were

often lost in waiting for the delinquents. All state affairs were in the

hands of this fierce democracy. The elected chieftains had rather

authority to persuade than power to command.

The Gauls were an agricultural people. They were not without many arts of

life. They had extensive flocks and herds; and they even exported salted

provisions as far as Rome. The truculent German, Ger-mane, Heer-mann,

War-man, considered carnage the only useful occupation, and despised

agriculture as enervating and ignoble. It was base, in his opinion, to

gain by sweat what was more easily acquired by blood. The land was

divided annually by the magistrates, certain farms being assigned to

certain families, who were forced to leave them at the expiration of the

year. They cultivated as a common property the lands allotted by the

magistrates, but it was easier to summon them to the battle-field than to

the plough. Thus they were more fitted for the roaming and conquering

life which Providence was to assign to them for ages, than if they had

become more prone to root themselves in the soil. The Gauls built towns

and villages. The German built his solitary hut where inclination

prompted. 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 their

authority was despotic. What were the principles of their wild Theology

will never be thoroughly ascertained, but we know too much of its

sanguinary rites. The imagination shudders to penetrate those shaggy

forests, ringing with the death-shrieks of ten thousand human victims,

and with the hideous hymns chanted by smoke-and-blood-stained priests to

the savage gods whom they served.

The German, in his simplicity, had raised himself to a purer belief than

that of the sensuous Roman or the superstitious Gaul. He believed in a

single, supreme, almighty God, All-Vater or All-father. This Divinity was

too sublime to be incarnated or imaged, too infinite to be enclosed in

temples built with hands. Such is the Roman's testimony to the lofty

conception of the German. Certain forests were consecrated to the unseen

God whom the eye of reverent faith could alone behold. Thither, at stated

times, the people repaired to worship. They entered the sacred grove with

feet bound together, in token of submission. Those who fell were

forbidden to rise, but dragged themselves backwards on the ground. Their

rules 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 be

confessed that in a later age, a single victim, a criminal or a prisoner,

was occasionally immolated. The purity of their religion was soon stained

by their Celtic neighborhood. In the course of the Roman dominion it

became contaminated, and at last profoundly depraved. The fantastic

intermixture of Roman mythology with the gloomy but modified superstition

of Romanized Celts was not favorable to the simple character of German

theology. The entire extirpation, thus brought about, of any conceivable

system of religion, prepared the way for a true revelation. Within that

little river territory, amid those obscure morasses of the Rhine and

Scheld, three great forms of religion--the sanguinary superstition of the

Druid, the sensuous polytheism of the Roman, the elevated but dimly

groping creed of the German, stood for centuries, face to face, until,

having mutually debased and destroyed each other, they all faded away in

the 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 as

the Celt was dissolute. Alone among barbarians, he contented himself with

a single wife, save that a few dignitaries, from motives of policy, were

permitted a larger number. On the marriage day the German offered

presents to his bride--not the bracelets and golden necklaces with which

the Gaul adorned his fair-haired concubine, but oxen and a bridled horse,

a sword, a shield, and a spear-symbols that thenceforward she was to

share his labors and to become a portion of himself.

They differed, too, in the honors paid to the dead. The funerals of the

Gauls were pompous. Both burned the corpse, but the Celt cast into the

flames the favorite animals, and even the most cherished slaves and

dependents of the master. Vast monuments of stone or piles of earth were

raised above the ashes of the dead. Scattered relics of the Celtic age

are yet visible throughout Europe, in these huge but unsightly memorials.

The German was not ambitious at the grave. He threw neither garments nor

odors upon the funeral pyre, but the arms and the war-horse of the

departed were burned and buried with him.

The turf was his only sepulchre, the memory of his valor his only

monument. Even tears were forbidden to the men. "It was esteemed

honorable," says the historian, "for women to lament, for men to

remember."

The parallel need be pursued no further. Thus much it was necessary to

recall to the historical student concerning the prominent characteristics

by which the two great races of the land were distinguished:

characteristics which Time has rather hardened than effaced. In the

contrast and the separation lies the key to much of their history. Had

Providence permitted a fusion of the two races, it is, possible, from

their position, and from the geographical and historical link which they

would have afforded to the dominant tribes of Europe, that a world-empire

might have been the result, different in many respects from any which has

ever arisen. Speculations upon what might have been are idle. It is well,

however; to ponder the many misfortunes resulting from a mutual

repulsion, which, under other circumstances and in other spheres, has

been exchanged for mutual attraction and support.

It is now necessary to sketch rapidly the political transformations

undergone by the country, from the early period down to the middle of the

sixteenth century; the epoch when the long agony commenced, out of which

the Batavian republic was born.

III.

The earliest chapter in the history of the Netherlands was written by

their conqueror. Celtic Gaul is already in the power of Rome; the Belgic

tribes, alarmed at the approaching danger, arm against the universal,

tyrant. Inflammable, quick to strike, but too fickle to prevail against

so powerful a foe, they hastily form a league of almost every clan. At

the first blow of Caesar's sword, the frail confederacy falls asunder

like a rope of sand. The tribes scatter in all directions.

Nearly all are soon defeated, and sue for mercy. The Nervii, true to the

German blood in their veins, swear to die rather than surrender. They,

at least, are worthy of their cause. Caesar advances against them at the

head of eight legions. Drawn up on the banks of the Sambre, they await

the 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 sends

some 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, are

seen charging up the hill into the midst of the enemy's force. "At the

same 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 is

brief. Eight veteran Roman legions, with the world's victor at their

head, are too much for the brave but undisciplined Nervii. Snatching a

shield from a soldier, and otherwise unarmed, Caesar throws himself into

the hottest of the fight. The battle rages foot to foot and hand to hand

but the hero's skill, with the cool valor of his troops, proves

invincible as ever. The Nervii, true to their vow, die, but not a man

surrenders. They fought upon that day till the ground was heaped with

their dead, while, as the foremost fell thick and fast, their comrades,

says the Roman, sprang upon their piled-up bodies, and hurled their

javelins at the enemy as from a hill. They fought like men to whom life

without liberty was a curse. They were not defeated, but exterminated. Of

many thousand fighting men went home but five hundred. Upon reaching the

place of refuge where they had bestowed their women and children, Caesar

found, after the battle, that there were but three of their senators left

alive. So perished the Nervii. Caesar commanded his legions to treat with

respect the little remnant of the tribe which had just fallen to swell

the empty echo of his glory, and then, with hardly a breathing pause, he

proceeded to annihilate the Aduatici, the Menapii, and the Morini.

Gaul being thus pacified, as, with sublime irony, he expresses himself

concerning a country some of whose tribes had been annihilated, some sold

as slaves, and others hunted to their lairs like beasts of prey, the

conqueror departed for Italy. Legations for peace from many German races

to Rome were the consequence of these great achievements. Among others

the Batavians formed an alliance with the masters of the world. Their

position was always an honorable one. They were justly proud of paying no

tribute, but it was, perhaps, because they had nothing to pay. They had

few cattle, they could give no hides and horns like the Frisians, and

they were therefore allowed to furnish only their blood. From this time

forth their cavalry, which was the best of Germany, became renowned in

the Roman army upon every battle-field of Europe.

It is melancholy, at a later moment, to find the brave Batavians

distinguished in the memorable expedition of Germanicus to crush the

liberties of their German kindred. They are forever associated with the

sublime 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 her

late-flowering literature has rendered so illustrious--but they are

associated as enemies, not as friends.

Galba, succeeding to the purple upon the suicide of Nero, dismissed the

Batavian life-guards to whom he owed his elevation. He is murdered, Otho

and Vitellius contend for the succession, while all eyes are turned upon

the eight Batavian regiments. In their hands the scales of empire seem to

rest. They declare for Vitellius, and the civil war begins. Otho is

defeated; Vitellius acknowledged by Senate and people. Fearing, like his

predecessors, the imperious turbulence of the Batavian legions, he, too,

sends them into Germany. It was the signal for a long and extensive

revolt, which had well nigh overturned the Roman power in Gaul and Lower

Germany.

IV.

Claudius Civilis was a Batavian of noble race, who had served twenty-five

years in the Roman armies. His Teutonic name has perished, for, like most

savages who become denizens of a civilized state, he had assumed an

appellation in the tongue of his superiors. He was a soldier of fortune,

and had fought wherever the Roman eagles flew. After a quarter of a

century's service he was sent in chains to Rome, and his brother

executed, both falsely charged with conspiracy. Such were the triumphs

adjudged to Batavian auxiliaries. He escaped with life, and was disposed

to consecrate what remained of it to a nobler cause. Civilis was no

barbarian. Like the German hero Arminius, he had received a Roman

education, and had learned the degraded condition of Rome. He knew the

infamous vices of her rulers; he retained an unconquerable love for

liberty and for his own race. Desire to avenge his own wrongs was mingled

with loftier motives in his breast. He knew that the sceptre was in the

gift of the Batavian soldiery. Galba had been murdered, Otho had

destroyed himself, and Vitellius, whose weekly gluttony cost the empire

more gold than would have fed the whole Batavian population and converted

their whole island-morass into fertile pastures, was contending for the

purple with Vespasian, once an obscure adventurer like Civilis himself,

and even his friend and companion in arms. It seemed a time to strike a

blow for freedom.

By his courage, eloquence, and talent for political combinations, Civilis

effected a general confederation of all the Netherland tribes, both

Celtic and German. For a brief moment there was a united people, a

Batavian commonwealth. He found another source of strength in German

superstition. On the banks of the Lippe, near its confluence with the

Rhine, dwelt the Virgin Velleda, a Bructerian weird woman, who exercised

vast influence over the warriors of her nation. Dwelling alone in a lofty

tower, shrouded in a wild forest, she was revered as an oracle. Her

answers to the demands of her worshippers concerning future events were

delivered only to a chosen few. To Civilis, who had formed a close

friendship with her, she promised success, and the downfall of the Roman

world. Inspired by her prophecies, many tribes of Germany sent large

subsidies to the Batavian chief.

The details of the revolt have been carefully preserved by Tacitus, and

form one of his grandest and most elaborate pictures. The spectacle of a

brave nation, inspired by the soul of one great man and rising against an

overwhelming despotism, will always speak to the heart, from generation

to generation. The battles, the sieges, the defeats, the indomitable

spirit of Civilis, still flaming most brightly when the clouds were

darkest around him, have been described by the great historian in his

most powerful manner. The high-born Roman has thought the noble

barbarian's portrait a subject worthy his genius.

The struggle was an unsuccessful one. After many victories and many

overthrows, Civilis was left alone. The Gallic tribes fell off, and sued

for peace. Vespasian, victorious over Vitellius, proved too powerful for

his old comrade. Even the Batavians became weary of the hopeless contest,

while fortune, after much capricious hovering, settled at last upon the

Roman side. The imperial commander Cerialis seized the moment when the

cause of the Batavian hero was most desperate to send emissaries among

his tribe, and even to tamper with the mysterious woman whose prophecies

had so inflamed his imagination. These intrigues had their effect. The

fidelity of the people was sapped; the prophetess fell away from her

worshipper, and foretold ruin to his cause. The Batavians murmured that

their destruction was inevitable, that one nation could not arrest the

slavery which was destined for the whole world. How large a part of the

human race were the Batavians? What were they in a contest with the whole

Roman empire? Moreover, they were not oppressed with tribute. They were

only expected to furnish men and valor to their proud allies. It was the

next thing to liberty. If they were to have rulers, it was better to

serve a Roman emperor than a German witch.

Thus murmured the people. Had Civilis been successful, he would have been

deified; but his misfortunes, at last, made him odious in spite of his

heroism. But the Batavian was not a man to be crushed, nor had he lived

so long in the Roman service to be outmatched in politics by the

barbarous Germans. He was not to be sacrificed as a peace-offering to

revengeful Rome. Watching from beyond the Rhine the progress of defection

and the decay of national enthusiasm, he determined to be beforehand with

those who were now his enemies. He accepted the offer of negotiation from

Cerialis. The Roman general was eager to grant a full pardon, and to

re-enlist so brave a soldier in the service of the empire.

A colloquy was agreed upon. The bridge across the Nabalia was broken

asunder in the middle, and Cerialis and Civilis met upon the severed

sides. The placid stream by which Roman enterprise had connected the

waters of the Rhine with the lake of Flevo, flowed between the imperial

commander and the rebel chieftain.

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

Here the story abruptly terminates. The remainder of the Roman's

narrative is lost, and upon that broken bridge the form of the Batavian

hero disappears forever. His name fades from history: not a syllable is

known of his subsequent career; every thing is buried in the profound

oblivion which now steals over the scene where he was the most imposing

actor.

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. The

German patriot was neither braver nor wiser than the Batavian, but he had

the infinite forests of his fatherland to protect him. Every legion which

plunged into those unfathomable depths was forced to retreat

disastrously, or to perish miserably. Civilis was hemmed in by the ocean;

his country, long the basis of Roman military operations, was accessible

by river and canal, The patriotic spirit which he had for a moment

raised, had abandoned him; his allies had deserted him; he stood alone

and at bay, encompassed by the hunters, with death or surrender as his

only alternative. Under such circumstances, Hermann could not have shown

more courage or conduct, nor have terminated the impossible struggle with

greater dignity or adroitness.

The contest of Civilis with Rome contains a remarkable foreshadowing of

the 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 traits

of generosity, audacity and cruelty, the generous confidence, the broken

faith seem so closely to repeat themselves, that History appears to

present the self-same drama played over and over again, with but a change

of actors and of costume. There is more than a fanciful resemblance

between Civilis and William the Silent, two heroes of ancient German

stock, who had learned the arts of war and peace in the service of a

foreign and haughty world-empire. Determination, concentration of

purpose, constancy in calamity, elasticity almost preternatural,

self-denial, consummate craft in political combinations, personal

fortitude, and passionate patriotism, were the heroic elements in both.

The ambition of each was subordinate to the cause which he served. Both

refused the crown, although each, perhaps, contemplated, in the sequel, a

Batavian realm of which he would have been the inevitable chief. Both

offered the throne to a Gallic prince, for Classicus was but the

prototype of Anjou, as Brinno of Brederode, and neither was destined, in

this world, to see his sacrifices crowned with success.

The characteristics of the two great races of the land portrayed

themselves in the Roman and the Spanish struggle with much the same

colors. The Southrons, inflammable, petulant, audacious, were the first

to assault and to defy the imperial power in both revolts, while the

inhabitants of the northern provinces, slower to be aroused, but of more

enduring wrath, were less ardent at the commencement, but; alone,

steadfast at the close of the contest. In both wars the southern Celts

fell away from the league, their courageous but corrupt chieftains having

been purchased with imperial gold to bring about the abject submission of

their followers; while the German Netherlands, although eventually

subjugated by Rome, after a desperate struggle, were successful in the

great conflict with Spain, and trampled out of existence every vestige of

her authority. The Batavian republic took its rank among the leading

powers 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 depths

of Asia, outpourings of human rivets along the sides of the Altai

mountains, convulsions up-heaving r mote realms and unknown dynasties,

shock after shock throb bing throughout the barbarian world and dying

upon the edge of civilization, vast throes which shake the earth as

precursory pangs to the birth of a new empire--as dying symptoms of the

proud but effete realm which called itself the world; scattered hordes of

sanguinary, grotesque savages pushed from their own homes, and hovering

with vague purposes upon the Roman frontier, constantly repelled and

perpetually reappearing in ever-increasing swarms, guided thither by a

fierce instinct, or by mysterious laws--such are the well known phenomena

which preceded the fall of western Rome. Stately, externally powerful,

although undermined and putrescent at the core, the death-stricken empire

still dashed back the assaults of its barbarous enemies.

During the long struggle intervening between the age of Vespasian and

that of Odoacer, during all the preliminary ethnographical revolutions

which preceded the great people's wandering, the Netherlands remained

subject provinces. Their country was upon the high road which led the

Goths to Rome. Those low and barren tracts were the outlying marches of

the empire. Upon that desolate beach broke the first surf from the rising

ocean of German freedom which was soon to overwhelm Rome. Yet, although

the ancient landmarks were soon well nigh obliterated, the Netherlands

still remained faithful to the Empire, Batavian blood was still poured

out 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 the

Emperor Julian at Strasburg, the Batavian cavalry, as upon many other

great occasions, saving the day for despotism. This achievement, one of

the last in which the name appears upon historic record, was therefore as

triumphant for the valor as it was humiliating to the true fame of the

nation. Their individuality soon afterwards disappears, the race having

been partly exhausted in the Roman service, partly merged in the Frank

and Frisian tribes who occupy the domains of their forefathers.

For a century longer, Rome still retains its outward form, but the

swarming nations are now in full career. The Netherlands are successively

or simultaneously trampled by Franks, Vandals, Alani, Suevi, Saxons,

Frisians, and even Sclavonians, as the great march of Germany to

universal empire, which her prophets and bards had foretold, went

majestically forward. The fountains of the frozen North were opened, the

waters prevailed, but the ark of Christianity floated upon the flood. As

the deluge assuaged, the earth had returned to chaos, the last pagan

empire 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 much

the same ethnological character as before. The Frank dominion has

succeeded the Roman, the German stock preponderates over the Celtic, but

the national ingredients, although in somewhat altered proportions,

remain essentially the same. The old Belgae, having become Romanized in

tongue and customs, accept the new Empire of the Franks. That people,

however, pushed from their hold of the Rhine by thickly thronging hordes

of Gepidi, Quadi, Sarmati, Heruli, Saxons, Burgundians, move towards the

South and West. As the Empire falls before Odoacer, they occupy Celtic

Gaul with the Belgian portion of the Netherlands; while the Frisians,

into which ancient German tribe the old Batavian element has melted, not

to be extinguished, but to live a renovated existence, the "free

Frisians;" whose name is synonymous with liberty, nearest blood relations

of the Anglo-Saxon race, now occupy the northern portion, including the

whole future European territory of the Dutch republic.

The history of the Franks becomes, therefore, the history of the

Netherlands. The Frisians struggle, for several centuries, against their

dominion, until eventually subjugated by Charlemagne. They even encroach

upon the Franks in Belgic Gaul, who are determined not to yield their

possessions. Moreover, the pious Merovingian faineans desire to plant

Christianity among the still pagan Frisians. Dagobert, son of the second

Clotaire, advances against them as far as the Weser, takes possession of

Utrecht, founds there the first Christian church in Friesland, and

establishes a nominal dominion over the whole country.

Yet the feeble Merovingians would have been powerless against rugged

Friesland, had not their dynasty already merged in that puissant family

of 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 exchange

his royal for the ducal title.

It was Pepin's bastard, Charles the Hammer, whose tremendous blows

completed his father's work. The new mayor of the palace soon drove the

Frisian chief into submission, and even into Christianity. A bishop's

indiscretion, however, neutralized the apostolic blows of the mayor. The

pagan Radbod had already immersed one of his royal legs in the baptismal

font, when a thought struck him. "Where are my dead forefathers at

present?" he said, turning suddenly upon Bishop Wolfran. "In Hell, with

all other unbelievers," was the imprudent answer. "Mighty well," replied

Radbod, removing his leg, "then will I rather feast with my ancestors in

the halls of Woden, than dwell with your little starveling hand of

Christians in Heaven." Entreaties and threats were unavailing. The

Frisian declined positively a rite which was to cause an eternal

separation from his buried kindred, and he died as he had lived, a

heathen. His son, Poppa, succeeding to the nominal sovereignty, did not

actively oppose the introduction of Christianity among his people, but

himself refused to be converted. Rebelling against the Frank dominion, he

was totally routed by Charles Martell in a great battle (A.D.750) and

perished with a vast number of Frisians. The Christian dispensation, thus

enforced, was now accepted by these northern pagans. The commencement of

their conversion had been mainly the work of their brethren from Britain.

The monk Wilfred was followed in a few years by the Anglo-Saxon

Willibrod. It was he who destroyed the images of Woden in Walcheren,

abolished his worship, and founded churches in North Holland. Charles

Martell rewarded him with extensive domains about Utrecht, together with

many slaves and other chattels. Soon afterwards he was consecrated Bishop

of all the Frisians. Thus rose the famous episcopate of Utrecht. Another

Anglo-Saxon, Winfred, or Bonifacius, had been equally active among his

Frisian cousins. His crozier had gone hand in hand with the battle-axe.

Bonifacius followed close upon the track of his orthodox coadjutor

Charles. By the middle of the eighth century, some hundred thousand

Frisians had been slaughtered, and as many more converted. The hammer

which smote the Saracens at Tours was at last successful in beating the

Netherlanders into Christianity. The labors of Bonifacius through Upper

and Lower Germany were immense; but he, too, received great material

rewards. He was created Archbishop of Mayence, and, upon the death of

Willibrod, Bishop of Utrecht. Faithful to his mission, however, he met,

heroically, a martyr's death at the hands of the refractory pagans at

Dokkum. Thus was Christianity established in the Netherlands.

Under Charlemagne, the Frisians often rebelled, making common cause with

the Saxons. In 785, A.D., they were, however, completely subjugated, and

never rose again until the epoch of their entire separation from the

Frank empire. Charlemagne left them their name of free Frisians, and the

property in their own land. The feudal system never took root in their

soil. "The Frisians," says their statute book; "shall be free, as long as

the wind blows out of the clouds and the world stands." They agreed,

however, to obey the chiefs whom the Frank monarch should appoint to

govern them, according to their own laws. Those laws were collected, and

are still extant. The vernacular version of their Asega book contains

their ancient customs, together with the Frank additions. The general

statutes of Charlemagne were, of course, in vigor also; but that great

legislator knew too well the importance attached by all mankind to local

customs, 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 again

united, in subjection to Charlemagne. Their union was but in forming a

single link in the chain of a new realm. The reign of Charlemagne had at

last accomplished the promise of the sorceress Velleda and other

soothsayers. A German race had re-established the empire of the world.

The Netherlands, like-the other provinces of the great monarch's

dominion, were governed by crown-appointed functionaries, military and

judicial. In the northeastern, or Frisian portion, however; the grants of

land were never in the form of revocable benefices or feuds. With this

important exception, the whole country shared the fate, and enjoyed the

general organization of the Empire.

But Charlemagne came an age too soon. The chaos which had brooded over

Europe since the dissolution of the Roman world, was still too absolute.

It was not to be fashioned into permanent forms, even by his bold and

constructive genius. A soil, exhausted by the long culture of Pagan

empires, was to lie fallow for a still longer period. The discordant

elements out of which the Emperor had compounded his realm, did not

coalesce during his life-time. They were only held together by the

vigorous grasp of the hand which had combined them. When the great

statesman died, his Empire necessarily fell to pieces. Society had need

of farther disintegration before it could begin to reconstruct itself

locally. A new civilization was not to be improvised by a single mind.

When did one man ever civilize a people? In the eighth and ninth

centuries there was not even a people to be civilized. The construction

of Charles was, of necessity, temporary. His Empire was supported by

artificial columns, resting upon the earth, which fell prostrate almost

as soon as the hand of their architect was cold. His institutions had not

struck down into the soil. There were no extensive and vigorous roots to

nourish, from below, a flourishing Empire through time and tempest.

Moreover, the Carlovingian race had been exhausted by producing a race of

heroes like the Pepins and the Charleses. The family became, soon, as

contemptible as the ox-drawn, long-haired "do-nothings" whom it had

expelled; but it is not our task to describe the fortunes of the

Emperor's ignoble descendants. The realm was divided, sub-divided, at

times partially reunited, like a family farm, among monarchs incompetent

alike to hold, to delegate, or--to resign the inheritance of the great

warrior and lawgiver. The meek, bald, fat, stammering, simple Charles, or

Louis, who successively sat upon his throne--princes, whose only historic

individuality consists in these insipid appellations--had not the sense

to comprehend, far less to develop, the plans of their ancestor.

Charles the Simple was the last Carlovingian who governed Lotharingia, in

which were comprised most of the Netherlands and Friesland. The German

monarch, Henry the Fowler, at that period called King of the East Franks,

as Charles of the West Franks, acquired Lotharingia by the treaty of

Bonn, Charles reserving the sovereignty over the kingdom during his

lifetime. In 925, A.D., however, the Simpleton having been imprisoned and

deposed by his own subjects, the Fowler was recognized King, of

Lotharingia. 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 other

petty sovereignties of the Netherlands became hereditary. It was in the

year 922 that Charles the Simple presented to Count Dirk the territory of

Holland, by letters patent. This narrow hook of land, destined, in future

ages, to be the cradle of a considerable empire, stretching through both

hemispheres, 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 for

centuries was ever the Bishop of Utrecht, the origin of whose greatness

has been already indicated. Of the other Netherland provinces, now or

before become hereditary, the first in rank was Lotharingia, once the

kingdom of Lothaire, now the dukedom of Lorraine. In 965 it was divided

into Upper and Lower Lorraine, of which the lower duchy alone belonged to

the Netherlands. Two centuries later, the Counts of Louvain, then

occupying most of Brabant, obtained a permanent hold of Lower Lorraine,

and began to call themselves Dukes of Brabant. The same principle of

local independence and isolation which created these dukes, established

the hereditary power of the counts and barons who formerly exercised

jurisdiction under them and others. Thus arose sovereign Counts of Namur,

Hainault, Limburg, Zutphen, Dukes of Luxemburg and Gueldres, Barons of

Mechlin, Marquesses of Antwerp, and others; all petty autocrats. The most

important of all, after the house of Lorraine, were the Earls of

Flanders; for the bold foresters of Charles the Great had soon wrested

the sovereignty of their little territory from his feeble descendants as

easily as Baldwin, with the iron arm, had deprived the bald Charles of

his daughter. Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Overyssel, Groningen, Drenthe

and Friesland (all seven being portions of Friesland in a general sense),

were crowded together upon a little desolate corner of Europe; an obscure

fragment of Charlemagne's broken empire. They were afterwards to

constitute the United States of the Netherlands, one of the most powerful

republics of history. Meantime, for century after century, the Counts of

Holland and the Bishops of Utrecht were to exercise divided sway over the

territory.

Thus the whole country was broken into many shreds and patches of

sovereignty. The separate history of such half-organized morsels is

tedious and petty. Trifling dynasties, where a family or two were every

thing, the people nothing, leave little worth recording. Even the most

devout of genealogists might shudder to chronicle the long succession of

so many illustrious obscure.

A glance, however, at the general features of the governmental system now

established in the Netherlands, at this important epoch in the world's

history, will show the transformations which the country, in common with

other portions of the western world, had undergone.

In the tenth century the old Batavian and later Roman forms have faded

away. An entirely new polity has succeeded. No great popular assembly

asserts its sovereignty, as in the ancient German epoch; no generals and

temporary kings are chosen by the nation. The elective power had been

lost under the Romans, who, after conquest, had conferred the

administrative authority over their subject provinces upon officials

appointed by the metropolis. The Franks pursued the same course. In

Charlemagne's time, the revolution is complete. Popular assemblies and

popular election entirely vanish. Military, civil, and judicial

officers-dukes, earls, margraves, and others--are all king's creatures,

'knegton des konings, pueri regis', and so remain, till they abjure the

creative power, and set up their own. The principle of Charlemagne, that

his officers should govern according to local custom, helps them to

achieve their own independence, while it preserves all that is left of

national liberty and law.

The counts, assisted by inferior judges, hold diets from time to

time--thrice, perhaps, annually. They also summon assemblies in case of

war. Thither are called the great vassals, who, in turn, call their

lesser vassals; each armed with "a shield, a spear, a bow, twelve arrows,

and a cuirass." Such assemblies, convoked in the name of a distant

sovereign, whose face his subjects had never seen, whose language they

could hardly understand, were very different from those tumultuous

mass-meetings, where boisterous freemen, armed with the weapons they

loved the best, and arriving sooner or later, according to their

pleasure, had been accustomed to elect their generals and magistrates and

to raise them upon their shields. The people are now governed, their

rulers appointed by an invisible hand. Edicts, issued by a power, as it

were, supernatural, demand implicit obedience. The people, acquiescing in

their own annihilation, abdicate not only their political but their

personal rights. On the other hand, the great source of power diffuses

less and less of light and warmth. Losing its attractive and controlling

influence, it becomes gradually eclipsed, while its satellites fly from

their prescribed bounds and chaos and darkness return. The sceptre,

stretched over realms so wide, requires stronger hands than those of

degenerate Carlovingians. It breaks asunder. Functionaries become

sovereigns, with hereditary, not delegated, right to own the people, to

tax their roads and rivers, to take tithings of their blood and sweat, to

harass them in all the relations of life. There is no longer a metropolis

to protect them from official oppression. Power, the more sub-divided,

becomes the more tyrannical. The sword is the only symbol of law, the

cross is a weapon of offence, the bishop is a consecrated pirate, every

petty baron a burglar, while the people, alternately the prey of duke,

prelate, and seignor, shorn and butchered like sheep, esteem it happiness

to sell themselves into slavery, or to huddle beneath the castle walls of

some little potentate, for the sake of his wolfish protection. Here they

build hovels, which they surround from time to time with palisades and

muddy entrenchments; and here, in these squalid abodes of ignorance and

misery, the genius of Liberty, conducted by the spirit of Commerce,

descends at last to awaken mankind from its sloth and cowardly stupor. A

longer night was to intervene; however, before the dawn of day.

The crown-appointed functionaries had been, of course, financial

officers. They collected the revenue of the sovereign, one third of which

slipped through their fingers into their own coffers. Becoming sovereigns

themselves, they retain these funds for their private emolument. Four

principal sources yielded this revenue: royal domains, tolls and imposts,

direct levies and a pleasantry called voluntary contributions or

benevolences. In addition to these supplies were also the proceeds of

fines. Taxation upon sin was, in those rude ages, a considerable branch

of the revenue. The old Frisian laws consisted almost entirely of a

discriminating tariff upon crimes. Nearly all the misdeeds which man is

prone to commit, were punished by a money-bote only. Murder, larceny,

arson, rape--all offences against the person were commuted for a definite

price. There were a few exceptions, such as parricide, which was followed

by 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 the

royal treasury was enriched by these imposts, the sovereign would hardly

attempt to check the annual harvest of iniquity by which his revenue was

increased. Still, although the moral sense is shocked by a system which

makes the ruler's interest identical with the wickedness of his people,

and holds out a comparative immunity in evil-doing for the rich, it was

better that crime should be punished by money rather than not be punished

at all. A severe tax, which the noble reluctantly paid and which the

penniless culprit commuted by personal slavery, was sufficiently unjust

as well as absurd, yet it served to mitigate the horrors with which

tumult, rapine, and murder enveloped those early days. Gradually, as the

light of reason broke upon the dark ages, the most noxious features of

the system were removed, while the general sentiment of reverence for law

remained.

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 REPUBLIC

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

1855

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION., Part 2.

VII.

Five centuries of isolation succeed. In the Netherlands, as throughout

Europe, a thousand obscure and slender rills are slowly preparing the

great stream of universal culture. Five dismal centuries of feudalism:

during which period there is little talk of human right, little obedience

to divine reason. Rights there are none, only forces; and, in brief,

three great forces, gradually arising, developing themselves, acting upon

each 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 the

people who feed thereon, distributes to his subalterns, often but a shade

beneath him in power, portions of his estate, getting the use of their

faithful swords in return. Vavasours subdivide again to vassals,

exchanging land and cattle, human or otherwise, against fealty, and so

the iron chain of a military hierarchy, forged of mutually interdependent

links, is stretched over each little province. Impregnable castles, here

more numerous than in any other part of Christendom, dot the level

surface of the country. Mail-clad knights, with their followers, encamp

permanently upon the soil. The fortunate fable of divine right is

invented to sanction the system; superstition and ignorance give currency

to the delusion. Thus the grace of God, having conferred the property in

a vast portion of Europe upon a certain idiot in France, makes him

competent to sell large fragments of his estate, and to give a divine,

and, therefore, most satisfactory title along with them. A great

convenience to a man, who had neither power, wit, nor will to keep the

property in his own hands. So the Dirks of Holland get a deed from

Charles the Simple, and, although the grace of God does not prevent the

royal grantor himself from dying a miserable, discrowned captive, the

conveyance to Dirk is none the less hallowed by almighty fiat. So the

Roberts and Guys, the Johns and Baldwins, become sovereigns in Hainault,

Brabant, Flanders and other little districts, affecting supernatural

sanction for the authority which their good swords have won and are ever

ready to maintain. Thus organized, the force of iron asserts and exerts

itself. Duke, count, seignor and vassal, knight and squire, master and

man swarm and struggle amain. A wild, chaotic, sanguinary scene. Here,

bishop and baron contend, centuries long, murdering human creatures by

ten thousands for an acre or two of swampy pasture; there, doughty

families, hugging old musty quarrels to their heart, buffet each other

from generation to generation; thus they go on, raging and wrestling

among themselves, with all the world, shrieking insane war-cries which no

human soul ever understood--red caps and black, white hoods and grey,

Hooks and Kabbeljaws, dealing destruction, building castles and burning

them, tilting at tourneys, stealing bullocks, roasting Jews, robbing the

highways, crusading--now upon Syrian sands against Paynim dogs, now in

Frisian quagmires against Albigenses, Stedingers, and other

heretics--plunging about in blood and fire, repenting, at idle times, and

paying their passage through, purgatory with large slices of ill-gotten

gains placed in the ever-extended dead-hand of the Church; acting, on the

whole, according to their kind, and so getting themselves civilized or

exterminated, it matters little which. Thus they play their part, those

energetic men-at-arms; and thus one great force, the force of iron, spins

and expands itself, century after century, helping on, as it whirls, the

great progress of society towards its goal, wherever that may be.

Another force--the force clerical--the power of clerks, arises; the might

of educated mind measuring itself against brute violence; a force

embodied, as often before, as priestcraft--the strength of priests: craft

meaning, simply, strength, in our old mother-tongue. This great force,

too, develops itself variously, being sometimes beneficent, sometimes

malignant. Priesthood works out its task, age after age: now smoothing

penitent death-beds, consecrating graves! feeding the hungry, clothing

the naked, incarnating the Christian precepts, in an age of rapine and

homicide, doing a thousand deeds of love and charity among the obscure

and forsaken--deeds of which there shall never be human chronicle, but a

leaf or two, perhaps, in the recording angel's book; hiving precious

honey from the few flowers of gentle, art which bloom upon a howling

wilderness; holding up the light of science over a stormy sea; treasuring

in convents and crypts the few fossils of antique learning which become

visible, as the extinct Megatherium of an elder world reappears after the

gothic deluge; and now, careering in helm and hauberk with the other

ruffians, bandying blows in the thickest of the fight, blasting with

bell, book, and candle its trembling enemies, while sovereigns, at the

head of armies, grovel in the dust and offer abject submission for the

kiss of peace; exercising the same conjury over ignorant baron and

cowardly hind, making the fiction of apostolic authority to bind and

loose, as prolific in acres as the other divine right to have and hold;

thus the force of cultivated intellect, wielded by a chosen few and

sanctioned by supernatural authority, becomes as potent as the sword.

A third force, developing itself more slowly, becomes even more potent

than the rest: the power of gold. Even iron yields to the more ductile

metal. The importance of municipalities, enriched by trade, begins to be

felt. Commerce, the mother of Netherland freedom, and, eventually, its

destroyer--even as in all human history the vivifying becomes afterwards

the dissolving principle--commerce changes insensibly and miraculously

the aspect of society. Clusters of hovels become towered cities; the

green and gilded Hanse of commercial republicanism coils itself around

the decaying trunk of feudal despotism. Cities leagued with cities

throughout and beyond Christendom-empire within empire-bind themselves

closer and closer in the electric chain of human sympathy and grow

stronger and stronger by mutual support. Fishermen and river raftsmen

become ocean adventurers and merchant princes. Commerce plucks up

half-drowned Holland by the locks and pours gold into her lap. Gold

wrests power from iron. Needy Flemish weavers become mighty

manufacturers. Armies of workmen, fifty thousand strong, tramp through

the swarming streets. Silk-makers, clothiers, brewers become the gossips

of kings, lend their royal gossips vast sums and burn the royal notes of

hand in fires of cinnamon wood. Wealth brings strength, strength

confidence. Learning to handle cross-bow and dagger, the burghers fear

less the baronial sword, finding that their own will cut as well, seeing

that great armies--flowers of chivalry--can ride away before them fast

enough at battles of spurs and other encounters. Sudden riches beget

insolence, tumults, civic broils. Internecine quarrels, horrible tumults

stain the streets with blood, but education lifts the citizens more and

more out of the original slough. They learn to tremble as little at

priestcraft as at swordcraft, having acquired something of each. Gold in

the 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, making

war 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 liberty

becomes a substantial fact. A fact, not a principle; for the old theorem

of sovereignty remains undisputed as ever. Neither the nation, in mass,

nor the citizens, in class, lay claim to human rights. All upper

attributes--legislative, judicial, administrative--remain in the

land-master's breast alone. It is an absurdity, therefore, to argue with

Grotius concerning the unknown antiquity of the Batavian republic. The

republic never existed at all till the sixteenth century, and was only

born after long years of agony. The democratic instincts of the ancient

German savages were to survive in the breasts of their cultivated

descendants, but an organized, civilized, republican polity had never

existed. The cities, as they grew in strength, never claimed the right to

make the laws or to share in the government. As a matter of fact, they

did make the laws, and shared, beside, in most important functions of

sovereignty, in the treaty-making power, especially. Sometimes by

bargains; sometimes by blood, by gold, threats, promises, or good hard

blows they extorted their charters. Their codes, statutes, joyful

entrances, and other constitutions were dictated by the burghers and

sworn to by the monarch. They were concessions from above; privileges

private laws; fragments indeed of a larger liberty, but vastly, better

than the slavery for which they had been substituted; solid facts instead

of empty abstractions, which, in those practical and violent days, would

have yielded little nutriment; but they still rather sought to reconcile

themselves, by a rough, clumsy fiction, with the hierarchy which they had

invaded, than to overturn the system. Thus the cities, not regarding

themselves as representatives or aggregations of the people, became

fabulous personages, bodies without souls, corporations which had

acquired vitality and strength enough to assert their existence. As

persons, therefore--gigantic individualities--they wheeled into the

feudal ranks and assumed feudal powers and responsibilities. The city of

Dort; of Middelburg, of Ghent, of Louvain, was a living being, doing

fealty, claiming service, bowing to its lord, struggling with its equals,

trampling upon its slaves.

Thus, in these obscure provinces, as throughout Europe, in a thousand

remote and isolated corners, civilization builds itself up, synthetically

and slowly; yet at last, a whole is likely to get itself constructed.

Thus, impelled by great and conflicting forces, now obliquely, now

backward, now upward, yet, upon the whole, onward, the new Society moves

along its predestined orbit, gathering consistency and strength as it

goes. Society, civilization, perhaps, but hardly humanity. The people has

hardly begun to extricate itself from the clods in which it lies buried.

There are only nobles, priests, and, latterly, cities. In the northern

Netherlands, the degraded condition of the mass continued longest. Even

in Friesland, liberty, the dearest blessing of the ancient Frisians, had

been forfeited in a variety of ways. Slavery was both voluntary and

compulsory. Paupers sold themselves that they might escape starvation.

The timid sold themselves that they might escape violence. These

voluntary sales, which were frequent, wore usually made to cloisters and

ecclesiastical establishments, for the condition of Church-slaves was

preferable to that of other serfs. Persons worsted in judicial duels,

shipwrecked sailors, vagrants, strangers, criminals unable to pay the

money-bote imposed upon them, were all deprived of freedom; but the

prolific source of slavery was war. Prisoners were almost universally

reduced to servitude. A free woman who intermarried with a slave

condemned herself and offspring to perpetual bondage. Among the Ripuarian

Franks, a free woman thus disgracing herself, was girt with a sword and a

distaff. Choosing the one, she was to strike her husband dead; choosing

the other, she adopted the symbol of slavery, and became a chattel for

life.

The ferocious inroads of the Normans scared many weak and timid persons

into servitude. They fled, by throngs, to church and monastery, and were

happy, by enslaving themselves, to escape the more terrible bondage of

the sea-kings. During the brief dominion of the Norman Godfrey, every

free Frisian was forced to wear a halter around his neck. The lot of a

Church-slave was freedom in comparison. To kill him was punishable by a

heavy fine. He could give testimony in court, could inherit, could make a

will, could even plead before the law, if law could be found. The number

of slaves throughout the Netherlands was very large; the number belonging

to the bishopric of Utrecht, enormous.

The condition of those belonging to laymen was much more painful. The

Lyf-eigene, or absolute slaves, were the most wretched. They were mere

brutes. They had none of the natural attributes of humanity, their life

and death were in the master's hands, they had no claim to a fraction of

their own labor or its fruits, they had no marriage, except under

condition of the infamous 'jus primoe noctis'. The villagers, or

villeins, were the second class and less forlorn. They could commute the

labor due to their owner by a fixed sum of money, after annual payment of

which, the villein worked for himself. His master, therefore, was not his

absolute proprietor. The chattel had a beneficial interest in a portion

of his own flesh and blood.

The crusades made great improvement in the condition of the serfs. He who

became a soldier of the cross was free upon his return, and many were

adventurous enough to purchase liberty at so honorable a price. Many

others were sold or mortgaged by the crusading knights, desirous of

converting their property into gold, before embarking upon their

enterprise. The purchasers or mortgagees were in general churches and

convents, so that the slaves, thus alienated, obtained at least a

preferable servitude. The place of the absent serfs was supplied by free

labor, so that agricultural and mechanical occupations, now devolving

upon a more elevated class, became less degrading, and, in process of

time, opened an ever-widening sphere for the industry and progress of

freemen. Thus a people began to exist. It was, however; a miserable

people, with personal, but no civil rights whatever. Their condition,

although better than servitude, was almost desperate. They were taxed

beyond their ability, while priest and noble were exempt. They had no

voice in the apportionment of the money thus contributed. There was no

redress against the lawless violence to which they were perpetually

exposed. In the manorial courts, the criminal sat in judgment upon his

victim. The functions of highwayman and magistrate were combined in one

individual.

By degrees, the class of freemen, artisans, traders, and the like,

becoming the more numerous, built stronger and better houses outside the

castle gates of the "land's master" or the burghs of the more powerful

nobles. The superiors, anxious to increase their own importance, favored

the progress of the little boroughs. The population, thus collected,

began to divide themselves into guilds. These were soon afterwards

erected by the community into bodies corporate; the establishment of the

community, of course, preceding, the incorporation of the guilds. Those

communities were created by charters or Keuren, granted by the sovereign.

Unless the earliest concessions of this nature have perished, the town

charters of Holland or Zeland are nearly a century later than those of

Flanders, France, and England.

The oldest Keur, or act of municipal incorporation, in the provinces

afterwards constituting the republic, was that granted by Count William

the First of Holland and Countess Joanna of Flanders, as joint

proprietors of Walcheren, to the town of Middelburg. It will be seen that

its 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 both

counts. Upon fighting, maiming, wounding, striking, scolding; upon

peace-breaking, upon resistance to peace-makers and to the judgment of

Schepens; upon contemning the Ban, upon selling spoiled wine, and upon

other misdeeds fines are imposed for behoof of the Count, the city, and

sometimes of the Schepens.......To all Middelburgers one kind of law is

guaranteed. Every man must go to law before the Schepens. If any one

being summoned and present in Walcheren does not appear, or refuses

submission to sentence, he shall be banished with confiscation of

property. Schout or Schepen denying justice to a complainant, shall,

until reparation, hold no tribunal again.......A burgher having a dispute

with an outsider (buiten mann) must summon him before the Schepens. An

appeal lies from the Schepens to the Count. No one can testify but a

householder. All alienation of real estate must take place before the

Schepens. If an outsider has a complaint against a burgher, the Schepens

and Schout must arrange it. If either party refuses submission to them,

they must ring the town bell and summon an assembly of all the burghers

to 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. No

Middelburger can be arrested or held in durance within Flanders or

Holland, except for crime."

This document was signed, sealed, and sworn to by the two sovereigns in

the 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 privileged

municipalities which obtained them, when viewed from an abstract

stand-point. They constituted, however, a very great advance from the

stand-point at which humanity actually found itself. They created, not

for all inhabitants, but for great numbers of them, the right, not to

govern them selves but to be governed by law: They furnished a local

administration of justice. They provided against arbitrary imprisonment.

They set up tribunals, where men of burgher class were to sit in

judgment. They held up a shield against arbitrary violence from above and

sedition from within. They encouraged peace-makers, punished

peace-breakers. They guarded the fundamental principle, 'ut sua

tanerent', to the verge of absurdity; forbidding a freeman, without a

freehold, from testifying--a capacity not denied even to a country slave.

Certainly all this was better than fist-law and courts manorial. For the

commencement of the thirteenth century, it was progress.

The Schout and Schepens, or chief magistrate and aldermen, were

originally appointed by the sovereign. In process of time, the election

of these municipal authorities was conceded to the communities. This

inestimable privilege, however, after having been exercised during a

certain period by the whole body of citizens, was eventually monopolized

by the municipal government itself, acting in common with the deans of

the various guilds.

Thus organized and inspired with the breath of civic life, the

communities of Flanders and Holland began to move rapidly forward. More

and more they assumed the appearance of prosperous little republics. For

this prosperity they were indebted to commerce, particularly with England

and the Baltic nations, and to manufactures, especially of wool.

The trade between England and the Netherlands had existed for ages, and

was still extending itself, to the great advantage of both countries. A

dispute, however, between the merchants of Holland and England, towards

the year 1215, caused a privateering warfare, and a ten years' suspension

of intercourse. A reconciliation afterwards led to the establishment of

the English wool staple, at Dort. A subsequent quarrel deprived Holland

of this great advantage. King Edward refused to assist Count Florence in

a war with the Flemings, and transferred the staple from Dort to Bruges

and Mechlin.

The trade of the Netherlands with the Mediterranean and the East was

mainly through this favored city of Bruges, which, already in the

thirteenth century, had risen to the first rank in the commercial world.

It was the resting-place for the Lombards and other Italians, the great

entrepot for their merchandise. It now became, in addition, the great

marketplace for English wool, and the woollen fabrics of all the

Netherlands, as well as for the drugs and spices of the East. It had,

however, by no means reached its apogee, but was to culminate with

Venice, and to sink with her decline. When the overland Indian trade fell

off with the discovery of the Cape passage, both cities withered. Grass

grew in the fair and pleasant streets of Bruges, and sea-weed clustered

about the marble halls of Venice. At this epoch, however, both were in a

state of rapid and insolent prosperity.

The cities, thus advancing in wealth and importance, were no longer

satisfied with being governed according to law, and began to participate,

not only in their own, but in the general government. Under Guy of

Flanders, the towns appeared regularly, as well as the nobles, in the

assembly of the provincial estates. (1386-1389, A.D.) In the course of

the following century, the six chief cities, or capitals, of Holland

(Dort, Harlem, Delft, Leyden, Goads, and Amsterdam) acquired the right of

sending their deputies regularly to the estates of the provinces. These

towns, therefore, with the nobles, constituted the parliamentary power of

the nation. They also acquired letters patent from the count, allowing

them to choose their burgomasters and a limited number of councillors or

senators (Vroedschappen).

Thus the liberties of Holland and Flanders waxed, daily, stronger. A

great physical convulsion in the course of the thirteenth century came to

add its influence to the slower process of political revolution. Hitherto

there had been but one Friesland, including Holland, and nearly all the

territory of the future republic. A slender stream alone separated the

two great districts. The low lands along the Vlie, often threatened, at

last sank in the waves. The German Ocean rolled in upon the inland Lake

of Flevo. The stormy Zuyder Zee began its existence by engulfing

thousands of Frisian villages, with all their population, and by

spreading a chasm between kindred peoples. The political, as well as the

geographical, continuity of the land was obliterated by this tremendous

deluge. The Hollanders were cut off from their relatives in the east by

as dangerous a sea as that which divided them from their Anglo-Saxon

brethren in Britain. The deputies to the general assemblies at Aurich

could no longer undertake a journey grown so perilous. West Friesland

became absorbed in Holland. East Friesland remained a federation of rude

but self-governed maritime provinces, until the brief and bloody dominion

of the Saxon dukes led to the establishment of Charles the Fifth's

authority. Whatever the nominal sovereignty over them, this most

republican tribe of Netherlanders, or of Europeans, had never accepted

feudalism. There was an annual congress of the whole confederacy. Each of

the seven little states, on the other hand, regulated its own internal

affairs. Each state was subdivided into districts, each district governed

by a Griet-mann (greatman, selectman) and assistants. Above all these

district officers was a Podesta, a magistrate identical, in name and

functions, with the chief officer of the Italian republics. There was

sometimes but one Podesta; sometimes one for each province. He was chosen

by the people, took oath of fidelity to the separate estates, or, if

Podesta-general, to the federal diet, and was generally elected for a

limited term, although sometimes for life. He was assisted by a board of

eighteen or twenty councillors. The deputies to the general congress were

chosen by popular suffrage in Easter-week. The clergy were not recognized

as a political estate.

Thus, in those lands which a niggard nature had apparently condemned to

perpetual poverty and obscurity, the principle of reasonable human

freedom, without which there is no national prosperity or glory worth

contending for, was taking deepest and strongest root. Already in the

thirteenth and fourteenth centuries Friesland was a republic, except in

name; Holland, Flanders, Brabant, had acquired a large share of

self-government. The powerful commonwealth, at a later period to be

evolved out of the great combat between centralized tyranny and the

spirit of civil and religious liberty, was already foreshadowed. The

elements, of which that important republic was to be compounded, were

germinating for centuries. Love of freedom, readiness to strike and bleed

at any moment in her cause, manly resistance to despotism, however

overshadowing, were the leading characteristics of the race in all

regions or periods, whether among Frisian swamps, Dutch dykes, the gentle

hills and dales of England, or the pathless forests of America.

Doubtless, the history of human liberty in Holland and Flanders, as every

where else upon earth where there has been such a history, unrolls many

scenes of turbulence and bloodshed; although these features have been

exaggerated by prejudiced historians. Still, if there were luxury and

insolence, sedition and uproar, at any rate there was life. Those violent

little commonwealths had blood in their veins. They were compact of

proud, self-helping, muscular vigor. The most sanguinary tumults which

they ever enacted in the face of day, were better than the order and

silence born of the midnight darkness of despotism. That very unruliness

was educating the people for their future work. Those merchants,

manufacturers, country squires, and hard-fighting barons, all pent up in

a narrow corner of the earth, quarrelling with each other and with all

the world for centuries, were keeping alive a national pugnacity of

character, for which there was to be a heavy demand in the sixteenth

century, and without which the fatherland had perhaps succumbed in the

most 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 to

characterize, is foreign to our purpose. By holding the clue of Holland's

history, the general maze of dynastic transformations throughout the

country may, however, be swiftly threaded. From the time of the first

Dirk to the close of the thirteenth century there were nearly four

hundred years of unbroken male descent, a long line of Dirks and

Florences. This iron-handed, hot-headed, adventurous race, placed as

sovereign upon its little sandy hook, making ferocious exertions to swell

into larger consequence, conquering a mile or two of morass or barren

furze, after harder blows and bloodier encounters than might have

established an empire under more favorable circumstances, at last dies

out. The courtship falls to the house of Avennes, Counts of Hainault.

Holland, together with Zeland, which it had annexed, is thus joined to

the province of Hainault. At the end of another half century the Hainault

line expires. William the Fourth died childless in 1355. His death is the

signal for the outbreak of an almost interminable series of civil

commotions. Those two great, parties, known by the uncouth names of Hook

and Kabbeljaw, come into existence, dividing noble against noble, city

against city, father against son, for some hundred and fifty years,

without foundation upon any abstract or intelligible principle. It may be

observed, however, that, in the sequel, and as a general rule, the

Kabbeljaw, or cod-fish party, represented the city or municipal faction,

while the Hooks (fish-hooks), that were to catch and control them, were

the nobles; iron and audacity against brute number and weight.

Duke William of Bavaria, sister's son--of William the Fourth, gets

himself 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 these

three Netherland provinces descends to his daughter Jacqueline, a damsel

of seventeen. Little need to trace the career of the fair and ill-starred

Jacqueline. Few chapters of historical romance have drawn more frequent

tears. The favorite heroine of ballad and drama, to Netherlanders she is

endued 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 her

own kinsmen, consoled for the cowardice and brutality of three husbands

by the gentle and knightly spirit of the fourth, dispossessed of her

father's broad domains, degraded from the rank of sovereign to be lady

forester of her own provinces by her cousin, the bad Duke of Burgundy,

Philip surnamed "the Good," she dies at last, and the good cousin takes

undisputed dominion of the land. (1437.)

The five centuries of isolation are at end. The many obscure streams of

Netherland history are merged in one broad current. Burgundy has absorbed

all the provinces which, once more, are forced to recognize a single

master. A century and a few years more succeed, during which this house

and its heirs are undisputed sovereigns of the soil.

Philip the Good had already acquired the principal Netherlands, before

dispossessing Jacqueline. He had inherited, beside the two Burgundies,

the counties of Flanders and Artois. He had purchased the county of

Namur, and had usurped the duchy of Brabant, to which the duchy of

Limburg, the marquisate of Antwerp, and the barony of Mechlin, had

already been annexed. By his assumption of Jacqueline's dominions, he was

now lord of Holland, Zeland, and Hainault, and titular master of

Friesland. He acquired Luxemburg a few years later.

Lord of so many opulent cities and fruitful provinces, he felt himself

equal to the kings of Europe. Upon his marriage with Isabella of

Portugal, he founded, at Bruges, the celebrated order of the Golden

Fleece. What could be more practical or more devout than the conception?

Did not the Lamb of God, suspended at each knightly breast, symbolize at

once the woollen fabrics to which so much of Flemish wealth and

Burgundian power was owing, and the gentle humility of Christ, which was

ever 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 a

leading provision, at the outset, forbade the brethren, crowned heads

excepted, to accept or retain the companionship of any other order.

The accession of so potent and ambitious a prince as the good Philip

boded evil to the cause of freedom in the Netherlands. The spirit of

liberty seemed to have been typified in the fair form of the benignant

and unhappy Jacqueline, and to be buried in her grave. The usurper, who

had crushed her out of existence, now strode forward to trample upon all

the laws and privileges of the provinces which had formed her heritage.

At his advent, the municipal power had already reached an advanced stage

of development. The burgher class controlled the government, not only of

the cities, but often of the provinces, through its influence in the

estates. Industry and wealth had produced their natural results. The

supreme authority of the sovereign and the power of the nobles were

balanced by the municipal principle which had even begun to preponderate

over both. All three exercised a constant and salutary check upon each

other. Commerce had converted slaves into freemen, freemen into burghers,

and the burghers were acquiring daily, a larger practical hold upon the

government. The town councils were becoming almost omnipotent. Although

with an oligarchical tendency, which at a later period was to be more

fully developed, they were now composed of large numbers of individuals,

who had raised themselves, by industry and intelligence, out of the

popular masses. There was an unquestionably republican tone to the

institutions. Power, actually, if not nominally, was in the hands of many

who 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 the

cities. In Holland, the clergy had neither influence nor seats in the

parliamentary body. Measures were proposed by the stadholder, who

represented the sovereign. A request, for example, of pecuniary,

accommodation, was made by that functionary or by the count himself in

person. The nobles then voted upon the demand, generally as one body, but

sometimes by heads. The measure was then laid before the burghers. If

they had been specially commissioned to act upon the matter; they voted,

each city as a city, not each deputy, individually. If they had received

no instructions, they took back the proposition to lay before the

councils of their respective cities, in order to return a decision at an

adjourned session, or at a subsequent diet. It will be seen, therefore,

that the principle of national, popular representation was but

imperfectly developed. The municipal deputies acted only under

instructions. Each city was a little independent state, suspicious not

only of the sovereign and nobles, but of its sister cities. This mutual

jealousy hastened the general humiliation now impending. The centre of

the system waging daily more powerful, it more easily unsphered these

feebler and mutually repulsive bodies.

Philip's first step, upon assuming the government, was to issue a

declaration, through the council of Holland, that the privileges and

constitutions, which he had sworn to as Ruward, or guardian, during the

period in which Jacqueline had still retained a nominal sovereignty, were

to be considered null and void, unless afterwards confirmed by him as

count. At a single blow he thus severed the whole knot of pledges, oaths

and other political complications, by which he had entangled himself

during his cautious advance to power. He was now untrammelled again. As

the conscience of the smooth usurper was, thenceforth, the measure of

provincial liberty, his subjects soon found it meted to them more

sparingly than they wished. From this point, then, through the Burgundian

period, and until the rise of the republic, the liberty of the

Netherlands, notwithstanding several brilliant but brief laminations,

occurring at irregular intervals, seemed to remain in almost perpetual

eclipse.

The material prosperity of the country had, however, vastly increased.

The fisheries of Holland had become of enormous importance. The invention

of the humble Beukelzoon of Biervliet, had expanded into a mine of

wealth. The fisheries, too, were most useful as a nursery of seamen, and

were already indicating Holland's future naval supremacy. The fishermen

were the militia of the ocean, their prowess attested in the war with the

Hanseatic cities, which the provinces of Holland and Zeland, in Philip's

name, but by their own unassisted exertions, carried on triumphantly at

this epoch. Then came into existence that race of cool and daring

mariners, who, in after times, were to make the Dutch name illustrious

throughout the world, the men, whose fierce descendants, the "beggars of

the sea," were to make the Spanish empire tremble, the men, whose later

successors swept the seas with brooms at the mast-head, and whose

ocean-battles with their equally fearless English brethren often lasted

four uninterrupted days and nights.

The main strength of Holland was derived from the ocean, from whose

destructive grasp she had wrested herself, but in whose friendly embrace

she remained. She was already placing securely the foundations of

commercial wealth and civil liberty upon those shifting quicksands which

the Roman doubted whether to call land or water. Her submerged deformity,

as she floated, mermaid-like, upon the waves was to be forgotten in her

material splendor. Enriched with the spoils of every clime, crowned with

the divine jewels of science and art, she was, one day, to sing a siren

song of freedom, luxury, and power.

As with Holland, so with Flanders, Brabant, and the other leading

provinces. Industry and wealth, agriculture, commerce, and manufactures,

were constantly augmenting. The natural sources of power were full to

overflowing, while the hand of despotism was deliberately sealing the

fountain.

For the house of Burgundy was rapidly culminating and as rapidly

curtailing the political privileges of the Netherlands. The contest was,

at first, favorable to the cause of arbitrary power; but little seeds

were silently germinating, which, in the progress of their gigantic

development, were, one day, to undermine the foundations of Tyranny and

to overshadow the world. The early progress of the religious reformation

in the Netherlands will be outlined in a separate chapter. Another great

principle was likewise at work at this period. At the very epoch when the

greatness of Burgundy was most swiftly ripening, another weapon was

secretly forging, more potent in the great struggle for freedom than any

which the wit or hand of man has ever devised or wielded. When Philip the

Good, in the full blaze of his power, and flushed with the triumphs of

territorial aggrandizement, was instituting at Bruges the order of the

Golden Fleece, "to the glory of God, of the blessed Virgin, and of the

holy Andrew, patron saint of the Burgundian family," and enrolling the

names 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, or

Lawrence the Sexton, succeeded in printing a little grammar, by means of

movable types. The invention of printing was accomplished, but it was not

ushered in with such a blaze of glory as heralded the contemporaneous

erection of the Golden Fleece. The humble setter of types did not deem

emperors and princes alone worthy his companionship. His invention sent

no thrill of admiration throughout Christendom; and yet, what was the

good Philip of Burgundy, with his Knights of the Golden Fleece, and all

their 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 not

belong to our purpose. The practical tendency of his government was to

repress the spirit of liberty, while especial privileges, extensive in

nature, but limited in time, were frequently granted to corporations.

Philip, in one day, conferred thirty charters upon as many different

bodies of citizens. These were, however, grants of monopoly not

concessions of rights. He also fixed the number of city councils or

Vroedschappen in many Netherland cities, giving them permission to

present a double list of candidates for burgomasters and judges, from

which he himself made the appointments. He was certainly neither a good

nor great prince, but he possessed much administrative ability. His

military talents were considerable, and he was successful in his wars. He

was an adroit dissembler, a practical politician. He had the sense to

comprehend that the power of a prince, however absolute, must depend upon

the prosperity of his subjects. He taxed severely the wealth, but he

protected the commerce and the manufactures of Holland and Flanders. He

encouraged art, science, and literature. The brothers, John and Hubert

Van Eyck, were attracted by his generosity to Bruges, where they painted

many pictures. John was even a member of the duke's council. The art of

oil-painting was carried to great perfection by Hubert's scholar, John of

Bruges. An incredible number of painters, of greater or less merit,

flourished at this epoch in the Netherlands, heralds of that great

school, which, at a subsequent period, was to astonish the world with

brilliant colors; profound science, startling effects, and vigorous

reproductions of Nature. Authors, too, like Olivier de la Marche and

Philippe de Comines, who, in the words of the latter, "wrote, not for the

amusement of brutes, and people of low degree, but for princes and other

persons of quality," these and other writers, with aims as lofty,

flourished at the court of Burgundy, and were rewarded by the Duke with

princely generosity. Philip remodelled and befriended the university of

Louvain. He founded at Brussels the Burgundian library, which became

celebrated throughout Europe. He levied largely, spent profusely, but was

yet so thrifty a housekeeper, as to leave four hundred thousand crowns of

gold, a vast amount in those days, besides three million marks' worth of

plate and furniture, to be wasted like water in the insane career of his

son.

The exploits of that son require but few words of illustration. Hardly a

chapter of European history or romance is more familiar to the world than

the one which records the meteoric course of Charles the Bold. The

propriety of his title was never doubtful. No prince was ever bolder, but

it is certain that no quality could be less desirable, at that particular

moment in the history of his house. It was not the quality to confirm a

usurping family in its ill-gotten possessions. Renewed aggressions upon

the rights of others justified retaliation and invited attack. Justice,

prudence, firmness, wisdom of internal administration were desirable in

the son of Philip and the rival of Louis. These attributes the gladiator

lacked entirely. His career might have been a brilliant one in the old

days of chivalry. His image might have appeared as imposing as the

romantic forms of Baldwin Bras de Fer or Godfrey of Bouillon, had he not

been misplaced in history. Nevertheless, he imagined himself governed by

a profound policy. He had one dominant idea, to make Burgundy a kingdom.

From the moment when, with almost the first standing army known to

history, and with coffers well filled by his cautious father's economy,

he threw himself into the lists against the crafty Louis, down to the day

when he was found dead, naked, deserted, and with his face frozen into a

pool of blood and water, he faithfully pursued this thought. His ducal

cap was to be exchanged for a kingly crown, while all the provinces which

lay beneath the Mediterranean and the North Sea, and between France and

Germany, were to be united under his sceptre. The Netherlands, with their

wealth, had been already appropriated, and their freedom crushed. Another

land of liberty remained; physically, the reverse of Holland, but stamped

with the same courageous nationality, the same ardent love of human

rights. Switzerland was to be conquered. Her eternal battlements of ice

and granite were to constitute the great bulwark of his realm. The world

knows well the result of the struggle between the lord of so many duchies

and earldoms, and the Alpine mountaineers. With all his boldness, Charles

was but an indifferent soldier. His only merit was physical courage. He

imagined himself a consummate commander, and, in conversation with his

jester, was fond of comparing himself to Hannibal. "We are getting well

Hannibalized to-day, my lord," said the bitter fool, as they rode off

together from the disastrous defeat of Gransen. Well "Hannibalized" he

was, too, at Gransen, at Murten, and at Nancy. He followed in the track

of his prototype only to the base of the mountains.

As a conqueror, he was signally unsuccessful; as a politician, he could

out-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 the

crown, which he might have secured, because he thought the emperor's son

unworthy the heiress of Burgundy; and yet, after his father's death, her

marriage with that very Maximilian alone secured the possession of her

paternal inheritance. Unsuccessful in schemes of conquest, and in

political intrigue, as an oppressor of the Netherlands, he nearly carried

out his plans. Those provinces he regarded merely as a bank to draw upon.

His immediate intercourse with the country was confined to the extortion

of vast requests. These were granted with ever-increasing reluctance, by

the estates. The new taxes and excises, which the sanguinary extravagance

of the duke rendered necessary, could seldom be collected in the various

cities without tumults, sedition, and bloodshed. Few princes were ever a

greater curse to the people whom they were allowed to hold as property.

He nearly succeeded in establishing a centralized despotism upon the

ruins of the provincial institutions. His sudden death alone deferred the

catastrophe. His removal of the supreme court of Holland from the Hague

to Mechlin, and his maintenance of a standing army, were the two great

measures by which he prostrated the Netherlands. The tribunal had been

remodelled by his father; the expanded authority which Philip had given

to a bench of judges dependent upon himself, was an infraction of the

rights of Holland. The court, however, still held its sessions in the

country; and the sacred privilege--de non evocando--the right of every

Hollander to be tried in his own land, was, at least, retained. Charles

threw off the mask; he proclaimed that this council--composed of his

creatures, holding office at his pleasure--should have supreme

jurisdiction over all the charters of the provinces; that it was to

follow his person, and derive all authority from his will. The usual seat

of the court he transferred to Mechlin. It will be seen, in the sequel,

that the attempt, under Philip the Second, to enforce its supreme

authority was a collateral cause of the great revolution of the

Netherlands.

Charles, like his father, administered the country by stadholders. From

the condition of flourishing self-ruled little republics, which they had,

for a moment, almost attained, they became departments of an

ill-assorted, ill-conditioned, ill-governed realm, which was neither

commonwealth nor empire, neither kingdom nor duchy; and which had no

homogeneousness 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 treasure

was squandered, the curse of a standing army fixed upon his people, the

trade and manufactures of the country paralyzed by his extortions, and he

accomplished nothing. He lost his life in the forty-fourth year of his

age (1477), leaving all the provinces, duchies, and lordships, which

formed the miscellaneous realm of Burgundy, to his only child, the Lady

Mary. Thus already the countries which Philip had wrested from the feeble

hand of Jacqueline, had fallen to another female. Philip's own

granddaughter, as young, fair, and unprotected as Jacqueline, was now

sole mistress of those broad domains.

VIII.

A crisis, both for Burgundy and the Netherlands, succeeds. Within the

provinces there is an elastic rebound, as soon as the pressure is removed

from them by the tyrant's death. A sudden spasm of liberty gives the

whole people gigantic strength. In an instant they recover all, and more

than all, the rights which they had lost. The cities of Holland,

Flanders, and other provinces call a convention at Ghent. Laying aside

their musty feuds, men of all parties-Hooks and Kabbeljaws, patricians

and people, move forward in phalanx to recover their national

constitutions. On the other hand, Louis the Eleventh seizes Burgundy,

claiming the territory for his crown, the heiress for his son. The

situation is critical for the Lady Mary. As usual in such cases, appeals

are made to the faithful commons. A prodigality of oaths and pledges is

showered upon the people, that their loyalty may be refreshed and grow

green. The congress meets at Ghent. The Lady Mary professes much, but she

will keep her vow. The deputies are called upon to rally the country

around the duchess, and to resist the fraud and force of Louis. The

congress is willing to maintain the cause of its young mistress. The

members declare, at the same time, very roundly, "that the provinces have

been much impoverished and oppressed by the enormous taxation imposed

upon them by the ruinous wars waged by Duke Charles from the beginning to

the end of his life." They rather require "to be relieved than

additionally encumbered." They add that, "for many years past, there has

been a constant violation of the provincial and municipal charters, and

that they should be happy to see them restored."

The result of the deliberations is the formal grant by Duchess Mary of

the "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 and

recognition of ancient rights, not an acquisition of new privileges. It

was a restoration, not a revolution. Its principal points deserve

attention from those interested in the political progress of mankind.

"The duchess shall not marry without consent of the estates of her

provinces. All offices in her gift shall be conferred on natives only. No

man shall fill two offices. No office shall be farmed. The 'Great Council

and Supreme Court of Holland' is re-established. Causes shall be brought

before it on appeal from the ordinary courts. It shall have no original

jurisdiction of matters within the cognizance of the provincial and

municipal tribunals. The estates and cities are guaranteed in their right

not to be summoned to justice beyond the limits of their territory. The

cities, in common with all the provinces of the Netherlands, may hold

diets as often ten and at such places as they choose. No new taxes shall

be imposed but by consent of the provincial estates. Neither the duchess

nor her descendants shall begin either an offensive or defensive war

without consent of the estates. In case a war be illegally undertaken,

the estates are not bound to contribute to its maintenance. In all public

and legal documents, the Netherland language shall be employed. The

commands of the duchess shall be invalid, if conflicting with the

privileges of a city.

"The seat of the Supreme Council is transferred from Mechlin to the

Hague. No money shall be coined, nor its value raised or lowered, but by

consent of the estates. Cities are not to be compelled to contribute to

requests which they have not voted. The sovereign shall come in person

before the estates, to make his request for supplies."

Here was good work. The land was rescued at a blow from the helpless

condition to which it had been reduced. This summary annihilation of all

the despotic arrangements of Charles was enough to raise him from his

tomb. The law, the sword, the purse, were all taken from the hand of the

sovereign and placed within the control of parliament. Such sweeping

reforms, if maintained, would restore health to the body politic. They

gave, moreover, an earnest of what was one day to arrive. Certainly, for

the fifteenth century, the "Great Privilege" was a reasonably liberal

constitution. Where else upon earth, at that day, was there half so much

liberty as was thus guaranteed? The congress of the Netherlands,

according to their Magna Charta, had power to levy all taxes, to regulate

commerce and manufactures, to declare war, to coin money, to raise armies

and navies. The executive was required to ask for money in person, could

appoint only natives to office, recognized the right of disobedience in

his subjects, if his commands should conflict with law, and acknowledged

himself bound by decisions of courts of justice. The cities appointed

their own magistrates, held diets at their own pleasure, made their local

by-laws and saw to their execution. Original cognizance of legal matters

belonged to the municipal courts, appellate jurisdiction to the supreme

tribunal, in which the judges were appointed by the sovereign. The

liberty of the citizen against arbitrary imprisonment was amply provided

for. The 'jus de non evocando', the habeas corpus of Holland, was

re-established.

Truly, here was a fundamental law which largely, roundly, and reasonably

recognized the existence of a people with hearts, heads, and hands of

their own. It was a vast step in advance of natural servitude, the dogma

of the dark ages. It was a noble and temperate vindication of natural

liberty, the doctrine of more enlightened days. To no people in the world

more than to the stout burghers of Flanders and Holland belongs the honor

of having battled audaciously and perennially in behalf of human rights.

Similar privileges to the great charter of Holland are granted to many

other provinces; especially to Flanders, ever ready to stand forward in

fierce vindication of freedom. For a season all is peace and joy; but the

duchess is young, weak, and a woman. There is no lack of intriguing

politicians, reactionary councillors. There is a cunning old king in the

distance, lying in wait; seeking what he can devour. A mission goes from

the estates to France. The well-known tragedy of Imbrecourt and Hugonet

occurs. Envoys from the states, they dare to accept secret instructions

from the duchess to enter into private negotiations with the French

monarch, against their colleagues--against the great charter--against

their country. Sly Louis betrays them, thinking that policy the more

expedient. They are seized in Ghent, rapidly tried, and as rapidly

beheaded by the enraged burghers. All the entreaties of the Lady Mary,

who, dressed in mourning garments, with dishevelled hair, unloosed

girdle, and streaming eyes; appears at the town-house and afterwards in

the market place, humbly to intercede for her servants, are fruitless

There is no help for the juggling diplomatists. The punishment was sharp.

Was it more severe and sudden than that which betrayed monarchs usually

inflict? Would the Flemings, at that critical moment, have deserved their

freedom had they not taken swift and signal vengeance for this first

infraction of their newly recognized rights? Had it not been weakness to

spare the traitors who had thus stained the childhood of the national joy

at 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 about

to become Habsburg property. The Ghenters reject the pretensions of the

dauphin, and select for husband of their duchess the very man whom her

father had so stupidly rejected. It had been a wiser choice for Charles

the Bold than for the Netherlanders. The marriage takes place on the 18th

of August, 1477. Mary of Burgundy passes from the guardianship of Ghent

burghers into that of the emperor's son. The crafty husband allies

himself with the city party, feeling where the strength lies. He knows

that the voracious Kabbeljaws have at last swallowed the Hooks, and run

away with them. Promising himself future rights of reconsideration, he is

liberal in promises to the municipal party. In the mean time he is

governor and guardian of his wife and her provinces. His children are to

inherit the Netherlands and all that therein is. What can be more

consistent than laws of descent, regulated by right divine? At the

beginning of the century, good Philip dispossesses Jacqueline, because

females can not inherit. At its close, his granddaughter succeeds to the

property, and transmits it to her children. Pope and emperor maintain

both positions with equal logic. The policy and promptness of Maximilian

are as effective as the force and fraud of Philip. The Lady Mary falls

from her horse and dies. Her son, Philip, four years of age, is

recognized as successor. Thus the house of Burgundy is followed by that

of Austria, the fifth and last family which governed Holland, previously

to the erection of the republic. Maximilian is recognized by the

provinces as governor and guardian, during the minority of his children.

Flanders alone refuses. The burghers, ever prompt in action, take

personal possession of the child Philip, and carry on the government in

his name. A commission of citizens and nobles thus maintain their

authority against Maximilian for several years. In 1488, the archduke,

now King of the Romans, with a small force of cavalry, attempts to take

the city of Bruges, but the result is a mortifying one to the Roman king.

The citizens of Bruges take him. Maximilian, with several councillors, is

kept a prisoner in a house on the market-place. The magistrates are all

changed, the affairs of government conducted in the name of the young

Philip alone. Meantime, the estates of the other Netherlands assemble at

Ghent; anxious, unfortunately, not for the national liberty, but for that

of the Roman king. Already Holland, torn again by civil feuds, and

blinded by the artifices of Maximilian, has deserted, for a season, the

great cause to which Flanders has remained so true. At last, a treaty is

made between the archduke and the Flemings. Maximilian is to be regent of

the other provinces; Philip, under guardianship of a council, is to

govern Flanders. Moreover, a congress of all the provinces is to be

summoned annually, to provide for the general welfare. Maximilian signs

and swears to the treaty on the 16th May, 1488. He swears, also, to

dismiss all foreign troops within four days. Giving hostages for his

fidelity, he is set at liberty. What are oaths and hostages when

prerogative, and the people are contending? Emperor Frederic sends to his

son an army under the Duke of Saxony. The oaths are broken, the hostages

left to their fate. The struggle lasts a year, but, at the end of it, the

Flemings are subdued. What could a single province effect, when its

sister states, even liberty-loving Holland, had basely abandoned the

common cause? A new treaty is made, (Oct.1489). Maximilian obtains

uncontrolled guardianship of his son, absolute dominion over Flanders and

the other provinces. The insolent burghers are severely punished for

remembering that they had been freemen. The magistrates of Ghent, Bruges,

and Ypres, in black garments, ungirdled, bare-headed, and kneeling, are

compelled to implore the despot's forgiveness, and to pay three hundred

thousand 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 himself

with 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 the

liberties which his wife and himself had sworn to protect. He had spurned

the authority of the "Great Privilege," and all other charters.

Burgomasters and other citizens had been beheaded in great numbers for

appealing to their statutes against the edicts of the regent, for voting

in favor of a general congress according to the unquestionable law. He

had proclaimed that all landed estates should, in lack of heirs male,

escheat to his own exchequer. He had debased the coin of the country, and

thereby authorized unlimited swindling on the part of all his agents,

from stadholders down to the meanest official. If such oppression and

knavery did not justify the resistance of the Flemings to the

guardianship of Maximilian, it would be difficult to find any reasonable

course in political affairs save abject submission to authority.

In 1493, Maximilian succeeds to the imperial throne, at the death of his

father. In the following year his son, Philip the Fair, now seventeen

years of age, receives the homage of the different states of the

Netherlands. He swears to maintain only the privileges granted by Philip

and Charles of Burgundy, or their ancestors, proclaiming null and void

all those which might have been acquired since the death of Charles.

Holland, Zeland, and the other provinces accept him upon these

conditions, thus ignominiously, and without a struggle, relinquishing the

Great Privilege, and all similar charters.

Friesland is, for a brief season, politically separated from the rest of

the country. Harassed and exhausted by centuries of warfare, foreign, and

domestic, the free Frisians, at the suggestion or command of Emperor

Maximilian, elect the Duke of Saxony as their Podesta. The sovereign

prince, naturally proving a chief magistrate far from democratic, gets

himself acknowledged, or submitted to, soon afterwards, as legitimate

sovereign of Friesland. Seventeen years afterward Saxony sells the

sovereignty to the Austrian house for 350,000 crowns. This little

country, whose statutes proclaimed her to be "free as the wind, as long

as it blew," whose institutions Charlemagne had honored and left

unmolested, who had freed herself with ready poniard from Norman tyranny,

who never bowed her neck to feudal chieftain, nor to the papal yoke, now

driven to madness and suicide by the dissensions of her wild children,

forfeits at last her independent existence. All the provinces are thus

united in a common servitude, and regret, too late, their supineness at a

moment when their liberties might yet have been vindicated. Their ancient

and cherished charters, which their bold ancestors had earned with the

sweat of their brows and the blood of their hearts, are at the mercy of

an autocrat, and liable to be superseded by his edicts.

In 1496, the momentous marriage of Philip the Fair with Joanna, daughter

of Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile and Aragon, is solemnized. Of this

union, 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 and

distant realms, under a single sceptre. Six years afterwards (Sept. 25,

1506), Philip dies at Burgos. A handsome profligate, devoted to his

pleasures, and leaving the cares of state to his ministers, Philip,

"croit-conseil," is the bridge over which the house of Habsburg passes to

almost 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 been

tracing from its source, empties itself at last into the ocean of a

world-empire. Count Dirk the First, lord of a half-submerged corner of

Europe, is succeeded by Count Charles the Second of Holland, better known

as Charles the Fifth, King of Spain, Sicily, and Jerusalem, Duke of

Milan, Emperor of Germany, Dominator in Asia and Africa, autocrat of half

the world. The leading events of his brilliant reign are familiar to

every child. The Netherlands now share the fate of so large a group of

nations, a fate, to these provinces, most miserable. The weddings of

Austria Felix were not so prolific of happiness to her subjects as to

herself. It can never seem just or reasonable that the destiny of many

millions of human beings should depend upon the marriage-settlements of

one man with one woman, and a permanent, prosperous empire can never be

reared upon so frail a foundation. The leading thought of the first

Charlemagne was a noble and a useful one, nor did his imperial scheme

seem chimerical, even although time, wiser than monarchs or lawgivers,

was to prove it impracticable. To weld into one great whole the various

tribes of Franks, Frisians, Saxons, Lombards, Burgundians, and others,

still in their turbulent youth, and still composing one great Teutonic

family; to enforce the mutual adhesion of naturally coherent masses, all

of one lineage, one language, one history, and which were only beginning

to exhibit their tendencies to insulation, to acquiesce in a variety of

local laws and customs, while an iron will was to concentrate a vast, but

homogeneous, people into a single nation; to raise up from the grave of

corrupt and buried Rome a fresh, vigorous, German, Christian empire; this

was a reasonable and manly thought. Far different the conception of the

second Charlemagne. To force into discordant union, tribes which, for

seven centuries, had developed themselves into hostile nations, separated

by geography and history, customs and laws, to combine many millions

under one sceptre, not because of natural identity, but for the sake of

composing one splendid family property, to establish unity by

annihilating local institutions, to supersede popular and liberal

charters by the edicts of a central despotism, to do battle with the

whole spirit of an age, to regard the souls as well as the bodies of vast

multitudes as the personal property of one individual, to strive for the

perpetuation in a single house of many crowns, which accident had

blended, and to imagine the consecration of the whole system by placing

the pope's triple diadem forever upon the imperial head of the

Habsburgs;--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 advantageous

or agreeable than that of the Netherlands and Spain. They were widely

separated geographically, while in history, manners, and politics, they

were utterly opposed to each other. Spain, which had but just assumed the

form of a single state by the combination of all its kingdoms, with its

haughty nobles descended from petty kings, and arrogating almost

sovereign power within their domains, with its fierce enthusiasm for the

Catholic religion, which, in the course of long warfare with the

Saracens, had become the absorbing characteristic of a whole nation, with

its sparse population scattered over a wide and stern country, with a

military spirit which led nearly all classes to prefer poverty to the

wealth attendant upon degrading pursuits of trade;--Spain, with her

gloomy, martial, and exaggerated character, was the absolute contrast of

the Netherlands.

These provinces had been rarely combined into a whole, but there was

natural affinity in their character, history, and position. There was

life, movement, bustling activity every where. An energetic population

swarmed in all the flourishing cities which dotted the surface of a

contracted and highly cultivated country. Their ships were the carriers

for the world;--their merchants, if invaded in their rights, engaged in

vigorous warfare with their own funds and their own frigates; their

fabrics were prized over the whole earth; their burghers possessed the

wealth of princes, lived with royal luxury, and exercised vast political

influence; their love of liberty was their predominant passion. Their

religious ardor had not been fully awakened; but the events of the next

generation were to prove that in no respect more than in the religious

sentiment, were the two races opposed to each other. It was as certain

that the Netherlanders would be fierce reformers as that the Spaniards

would be uncompromising persecutors. Unhallowed was the union between

nations thus utterly contrasted.

Philip the Fair and Ferdinand had detested and quarrelled with each other

from the beginning. The Spaniards and Flemings participated in the mutual

antipathy, and hated each other cordially at first sight. The

unscrupulous avarice of the Netherland nobles in Spain, their grasping

and venal ambition, enraged and disgusted the haughty Spaniards. This

international malignity furnishes one of the keys to a proper

understanding 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 regency

over them was entrusted by Charles to his near relatives, who governed in

the interest of his house, not of the country. His course towards them

upon the religious question will be hereafter indicated. The political

character of his administration was typified, and, as it were,

dramatized, on the occasion of the memorable insurrection at Ghent. For

this 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 partial

to the turbulent Flemings, asserted that there was no town in all

Christendom to be compared to it for size, power, political constitution,

or the culture of its inhabitants. It was, said one of its inhabitants at

the epoch of the insurrection, rather a country than a city. The activity

and wealth of its burghers were proverbial. The bells were rung daily,

and the drawbridges over the many arms of the river intersecting the

streets were raised, in order that all business might be suspended, while

the armies of workmen were going to or returning from their labors. As

early as the fourteenth century, the age of the Arteveldes, Froissart

estimated the number of fighting men whom Ghent could bring into the

field at eighty thousand. The city, by its jurisdiction over many large

but subordinate towns, disposed of more than its own immediate

population, which has been reckoned as high as two hundred thousand.

Placed in the midst of well cultivated plains, Ghent was surrounded by

strong walls, the external circuit of which measured nine miles. Its

streets and squares were spacious and elegant, its churches and other

public buildings numerous and splendid. The sumptuous church of Saint

John or Saint Bavon, where Charles the Fifth had been baptized, the

ancient castle whither Baldwin Bras de Fer had brought the daughter of

Charles the Bald, the city hall with its graceful Moorish front, the

well-known belfry, where for three centuries had perched the dragon sent

by the Emperor Baldwin of Flanders from Constantinople, and where swung

the famous Roland, whose iron tongue had called the citizens, generation

after generation, to arms, whether to win battles over foreign kings at

the 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 passions

which it had so long directed and inflamed.

The constitution of the city was very free. It was a little republic in

all but name. Its population was divided into fifty-two guilds of

manufacturers and into thirty-two tribes of weavers; each fraternity

electing annually or biennally its own deans and subordinate officers.

The senate, which exercised functions legislative, judicial, and

administrative, subject of course to the grand council of Mechlin and to

the sovereign authority, consisted of twenty-six members. These were

appointed partly from the upper class, or the men who lived upon their

means, partly from the manufacturers in general, and partly from the

weavers. They were chosen by a college of eight electors, who were

appointed 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 form

and of fact, added to the stormy character by which its citizens were

distinguished, would be most offensive in the eyes of Charles, and that

the delinquencies of the little commonwealth would be represented in the

most glaring colors by all those quiet souls, who preferred the

tranquillity of despotism to the turbulence of freedom. The city claimed,

moreover, the general provisions of the "Great Privilege" of the Lady

Mary, the Magna Charta, which, according to the monarchical party, had

been legally abrogated by Maximilian. The liberties of the town had also

been nominally curtailed by the "calf-skin" (Kalf Vel). By this

celebrated document, Charles the Fifth, then fifteen years of age, had

been made to threaten with condign punishment all persons who should

maintain that he had sworn at his inauguration to observe any privileges

or charters claimed by the Ghenters before the peace of Cadsand.

The immediate cause of the discontent, the attempt to force from Flanders

a subsidy of four hundred thousand caroli, as the third part of the

twelve hundred thousand granted by the states of the Netherlands, and the

resistance of Ghent in opposition to the other three members of the

province, will, of course, be judged differently, according as the

sympathies are stronger with popular rights or with prerogative. The

citizens claimed that the subsidy could only be granted by the unanimous

consent of the four estates of the province. Among other proofs of this

their unquestionable right, they appealed to a muniment, which had never

existed, save in the imagination of the credulous populace. At a certain

remote epoch, one of the Counts of Flanders, it was contended, had

gambled away his countship to the Earl of Holland, but had been

extricated from his dilemma by the generosity of Ghent. The burghers of

the town had paid the debts and redeemed the sovereignty of their lord,

and had thereby gained, in return, a charter, called the Bargain of

Flanders (Koop van Flandern). Among the privileges granted by this

document, was an express stipulation that no subsidy should ever be

granted by the province without the consent of Ghent. This charter would

have been conclusive in the present emergency, had it not labored under

the disadvantage of never having existed. It was supposed by many that

the magistrates, some of whom were favorable to government, had hidden

the document. Lieven Pyl, an ex-senator, was supposed to be privy to its

concealment. He was also, with more justice, charged with an act of great

baseness and effrontery. Reputed by the citizens to carry to the Queen

Regent their positive refusal to grant the subsidy, he had, on the

contrary, given an answer, in their name, in the affirmative. For these

delinquencies, the imaginary and the real, he was inhumanly tortured and

afterwards beheaded. "I know, my children," said he upon the scaffold,

"that you will be grieved when you have seen my blood flow, and that you

will regret me when it is too late." It does not appear, however, that

there was any especial reason to regret him, however sanguinary the

punishment which had requited his broken faith.

The mischief being thus afoot, the tongue of Roland, and the

easily-excited spirits of the citizens, soon did the rest. Ghent broke

forth into open insurrection. They had been willing to enlist and pay

troops under their own banners, but they had felt outraged at the

enormous contribution demanded of them for a foreign war, undertaken in

the 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 then

torn in shreds by the angry citizens, many of whom paraded the streets

with pieces of the hated document stuck in their caps, like plumes. From

these demonstrations they proceeded to intrigues with Francis the First.

He rejected them, and gave notice of their overtures to Charles, who now

resolved to quell the insurrection, at once. Francis wrote, begging that

the Emperor would honor him by coming through France; "wishing to assure

you," said he, "my lord and good brother, by this letter, written and

signed by my hand, upon my honor, and on the faith of a prince, and of

the best brother you have, that in passing through my kingdom every

possible honor and hospitality will be offered you, even as they could be

to myself." Certainly, the French king, after such profuse and voluntary

pledges, to confirm which he, moreover, offered his two sons and other

great individuals as hostages, could not, without utterly disgracing

himself, have taken any unhandsome advantage of the Emperor's presence in

his dominions. The reflections often made concerning the high-minded

chivalry of Francis, and the subtle knowledge of human nature displayed

by Charles upon the occasion, seem, therefore, entirely superfluous. The

Emperor came to Paris. "Here," says a citizen of Ghent, at the time, who

has left a minute account of the transaction upon record, but whose

sympathies were ludicrously with the despot and against his own

townspeople, "here the Emperor was received as if the God of Paradise had

descended." On the 9th of February, 1540, he left Brussels; on the 14th

he came to Ghent. His entrance into the city lasted more than six hours.

Four thousand lancers, one thousand archers, five thousand halberdmen and

musqueteers composed his bodyguard, all armed to the teeth and ready for

combat. The Emperor rode in their midst, surrounded by "cardinals,

archbishops, bishops, and other great ecclesiastical lords," so that the

terrors of the Church were combined with the panoply of war to affright

the souls of the turbulent burghers. A brilliant train of "dukes,

princes, earls, barons, grand masters, and seignors, together with most

of the Knights of the Fleece," were, according to the testimony of the

same eyewitness, in attendance upon his Majesty. This unworthy son of

Ghent 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 to

be met with." Especially the fine clothes of these distinguished guests

excited his warmest admiration. It was wonderful to behold, he said, "the

nobility and great richness of the princes and seignors, displayed as

well in their beautiful furs, martins and sables, as in the great chains

of fine gold which they wore twisted round their necks, and the pearls

and precious stones in their bonnets and otherwise, which they displayed

in great abundance. It was a very triumphant thing to see them so richly

dressed 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's

visit. Charles allowed a month of awful suspense to intervene between his

arrival and his vengeance. Despair and hope alternated during the

interval. On the 17th of March, the spell was broken by the execution of

nineteen persons, who were beheaded as ringleaders. On the 29th of April,

he pronounced sentence upon the city. The hall where it was rendered was

open to all comers, and graced by the presence of the Emperor, the Queen

Regent, and the great functionaries of Court, Church, and State. The

decree, 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 general

every thing which the corporation, or the traders, each and all,

possessed in common. In particular, the great bell--Roland was condemned

and sentenced to immediate removal. It was decreed that the four hundred

thousand florins, which had caused the revolt, should forthwith be paid,

together with an additional fine by Ghent of one hundred and fifty

thousand, besides six thousand a year, forever after. In place of their

ancient and beloved constitution, thus annihilated at a blow, was

promulgated a new form of municipal government of the simplest kind,

according to which all officers were in future to be appointed by himself

and the guilds, to be reduced to half their number; shorn of all

political power, and deprived entirely of self-government. It was,

moreover, decreed, that the senators, their pensionaries, clerks and

secretaries, thirty notable burghers, to be named by the Emperor, with

the great dean and second dean of the weavers, all dressed in black

robes, without their chains, and bareheaded, should appear upon an

appointed day, in company with fifty persons from the guilds, and fifty

others, to be arbitrarily named, in their shirts, with halters upon their

necks. This large number of deputies, as representatives of the city,

were then to fall upon their knees before the Emperor, say in a loud and

intelligible voice, by the mouth of one of their clerks, that they were

extremely 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 and

forgiveness.

The third day of May was appointed for the execution of the sentence.

Charles, who was fond of imposing exhibitions and prided himself upon

arranging them with skill, was determined that this occasion should be

long remembered by all burghers throughout his dominions who might be

disposed to insist strongly upon their municipal rights. The streets were

alive with troops: cavalry and infantry in great numbers keeping strict

guard at every point throughout the whole extent of the city; for it was

known that the hatred produced by the sentence was most deadly, and that

nothing but an array of invincible force could keep those hostile

sentiments in check. The senators in their black mourning robes, the

other deputies in linen shirts, bareheaded, with halters on their necks,

proceeded, at the appointed hour, from the senate house to the imperial

residence. High on his throne, with the Queen Regent at his side,

surrounded by princes, prelates and nobles, guarded by his archers and

halberdiers, his crown on his head and his sceptre in his hand, the

Emperor, exalted, sat. The senators and burghers, in their robes cf

humiliation, knelt in the dust at his feet. The prescribed words of

contrition and of supplication for mercy were then read by the

pensionary, all the deputies remaining upon their knees, and many of them

crying bitterly with rage and shame. "What principally distressed them,"

said the honest citizen, whose admiration for the brilliant accoutrement

of the princes and prelates has been recorded, "was to have the halter on

their necks, which they found hard to bear, and, if they had not been

compelled, 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 of

reasonable wrath and of natural benignity, performed his part with much

dramatic effect. "He held himself coyly for a little time," says the

eye-witness, "without saying a word; deporting himself as though he were

considering whether or not he would grant the pardon for which the

culprits had prayed." Then the Queen Regent enacted her share in the

show. Turning to his Majesty "with all reverence, honor and humility, she

begged that he would concede forgiveness, in honor of his nativity, which

had occurred in that city."

Upon this the Emperor "made a fine show of benignity," and replied "very

sweetly" that in consequence of his "fraternal love for her, by reason of

his being a gentle and virtuous prince, who preferred mercy to the rigor

of justice, and in view of their repentance, he would accord his pardon

to the citizens."

The Netherlands, after this issue to the struggle of Ghent, were reduced,

practically, to a very degraded condition. The form of local

self-government remained, but its spirit, when invoked, only arose to be

derided. The supreme court of Mechlin, as in the days of Charles the

Bold, was again placed in despotic authority above the ancient charters.

Was it probable that the lethargy of provinces, which had reached so high

a point of freedom only to be deprived of it at last, could endure

forever? Was it to be hoped that the stern spirit of religious

enthusiasm, 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 Netherland

revolt in the sixteenth century without taking a rapid retrospective

survey of the religious phenomena exhibited in the provinces. The

introduction of Christianity has been already indicated. From the

earliest times, neither prince, people, nor even prelates were very

dutiful to the pope. As the papal authority made progress, strong

resistance was often made to its decrees. The bishops of Utrecht were

dependent for their wealth and territory upon the good will of the

Emperor. They were the determined opponents of Hildebrand, warm adherents

of the Hohenstaufers-Ghibelline rather than Guelph. Heresy was a plant of

early growth in the Netherlands. As early as the beginning of the 12th

century, the notorious Tanchelyn preached at Antwerp, attacking the

authority of the pope and of all other ecclesiastics; scoffing at the

ceremonies and sacraments of the Church. Unless his character and career

have been grossly misrepresented, he was the most infamous of the many

impostors who have so often disgraced the cause of religious reformation.

By more than four centuries, he anticipated the licentiousness and

greediness manifested by a series of false prophets, and was the first to

turn both the stupidity of a populace and the viciousness of a priesthood

to his own advancement; an ambition which afterwards reached its most

signal expression in the celebrated John of Leyden.

The impudence of Tanchelyn and the superstition of his followers seem

alike incredible. All Antwerp was his harem. He levied, likewise, vast

sums upon his converts, and whenever he appeared in public, his apparel

and pomp were befitting an emperor. Three thousand armed satellites

escorted his steps and put to death all who resisted his commands. So

groveling became the superstition of his followers that they drank of the

water in which, he had washed, and treasured it as a divine elixir.

Advancing still further in his experiments upon human credulity, he

announced his approaching marriage with the Virgin Mary, bade all his

disciples to the wedding, and exhibited himself before an immense crowd

in company with an image of his holy bride. He then ordered the people to

provide for the expenses of the nuptials and the dowry of his wife,

placing a coffer upon each side of the image, to receive the

contributions of either sex. Which is the most wonderful manifestation in

the history of this personage--the audacity of the impostor, or the

bestiality of his victims? His career was so successful in the

Netherlands that he had the effrontery to proceed to Rome, promulgating

what he called his doctrines as he went. He seems to have been

assassinated by a priest in an obscure brawl, about the year 1115.

By the middle of the 12th century, other and purer heresiarchs had

arisen. Many Netherlanders became converts to the doctrines of Waldo.

From that period until the appearance of Luther, a succession of

sects--Waldenses, Albigenses, Perfectists, Lollards, Poplicans,

Arnaldists, Bohemian Brothers--waged perpetual but unequal warfare with

the power and depravity of the Church, fertilizing with their blood the

future field of the Reformation. Nowhere was the persecution of heretics

more relentless than in the Netherlands. Suspected persons were subjected

to various torturing but ridiculous ordeals. After such trial, death by

fire was the usual but, perhaps, not the most severe form of execution.

In Flanders, monastic ingenuity had invented another most painful

punishment for Waldenses and similar malefactors. A criminal whose guilt

had been established by the hot iron, hot ploughshare, boiling kettle, or

other logical proof, was stripped and bound to the stake:--he was then

flayed, from the neck to the navel, while swarms of bees were let loose

to fasten upon his bleeding flesh and torture him to a death of exquisite

agony.

Nevertheless heresy increased in the face of oppression The Scriptures,

translated by Waldo into French, were rendered into Netherland rhyme, and

the converts to the Vaudois doctrine increased in numbers and boldness.

At the same time the power and luxury of the clergy was waxing daily. The

bishops of Utrecht, no longer the defenders of the people against

arbitrary power, conducted themselves like little popes. Yielding in

dignity neither to king nor kaiser, they exacted homage from the most

powerful princes of the Netherlands. The clerical order became the most

privileged of all. The accused priest refused to acknowledge the temporal

tribunals. The protection of ecclesiastical edifices was extended over

all criminals and fugitives from justice--a beneficent result in those

sanguinary ages, even if its roots were sacerdotal pride. To establish an

accusation 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 and

write helped the clergy to much wealth. Privileges and charters from

petty princes, gifts and devises from private persons, were documents

which few, save ecclesiastics, could draw or dispute. Not content,

moreover, with their territories and their tithings, the churchmen

perpetually devised new burthens upon the peasantry. Ploughs, sickles,

horses, oxen, all implements of husbandry, were taxed for the benefit of

those who toiled not, but who gathered into barns. In the course of the

twelfth century, many religious houses, richly endowed with lands and

other property, were founded in the Netherlands. Was hand or voice raised

against clerical encroachment--the priests held ever in readiness a

deadly weapon of defence: a blasting anathema was thundered against their

antagonist, and smote him into submission. The disciples of Him who

ordered his followers to bless their persecutors, and to love their

enemies, invented such Christian formulas as these:--"In the name of the

Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost, the blessed Virgin Mary, John the

Baptist, Peter and Paul, and all other Saints in Heaven, do we curse and

cut off from our Communion him who has thus rebelled against us. May the

curse strike him in his house, barn, bed, field, path, city, castle. May

he be cursed in battle, accursed in praying, in speaking, in silence, in

eating, 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 him

to eternal shame; till he is destroyed by drowning or hanging, till he is

torn to pieces by wild beasts, or consumed by fire. Let his children

become orphans, his wife a widow. I command you, Devil, and all your

imps, that even as I now blow out these torches, you do immediately

extinguish the light from his eyes. So be it--so be it. Amen. Amen." So

speaking, the curser was wont to blow out two waxen torches which he held

in his hands, and, with this practical illustration, the anathema was

complete.

Such insane ravings, even in the mouth of some impotent beldame, were

enough to excite a shudder, but in that dreary epoch, these curses from

the lips of clergymen were deemed sufficient to draw down celestial

lightning upon the head, not of the blasphemer, but of his victim. Men,

who trembled neither at sword nor fire, cowered like slaves before such

horrid imprecations, uttered by tongues gifted, as it seemed, with

superhuman 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 was

already beginning to decline. It was not the corruption of the Church,

but its enormous wealth which engendered the hatred, with which it was by

many regarded. Temporal princes and haughty barons began to dispute the

right of ecclesiastics to enjoy vast estates, while refusing the burthen

of taxation, and unable to draw a sword for the common defence. At this

period, the Counts of Flanders, of Holland, and other Netherland

sovereigns, issued decrees, forbidding clerical institutions from

acquiring property, by devise, gift, purchase, or any other mode. The

downfall of the rapacious and licentious knights-templar in the provinces

and throughout Europe, was another severe blow administered at the same

time. The attacks upon Church abuses redoubled in boldness, as its

authority declined. Towards the end of the fourteenth century, the

doctrines of Wicklif had made great progress in the land. Early in the

fifteenth, the executions of Huss and Jerome of Prague, produce the

Bohemian 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, who

had felt the might of Ziska's arm, come back, feeling more sympathy with

the heresy which they had attacked, than with the Church for which they

had battled.

Meantime, the restrictions imposed by Netherland sovereigns upon clerical

rights to hold or acquire property, become more stern and more general.

On the other hand, with the invention of printing, the cause of

Reformation takes a colossal stride in advance. A Bible, which, before,

had cost five hundred crowns, now costs but five. The people acquire the

power of reading God's Word, or of hearing it read, for themselves. The

light of truth dispels the clouds of superstition, as by a new

revelation. The Pope and his monks are found to bear, very often, but

faint resemblance to Jesus and his apostles. Moreover, the instinct of

self-interest sharpens the eye of the public. Many greedy priests, of

lower rank, had turned shop-keepers in the Netherlands, and were growing

rich by selling their wares, exempt from taxation, at a lower rate than

lay hucksters could afford. The benefit of clergy, thus taking the bread

from the mouths of many, excites jealousy; the more so, as, besides their

miscellaneous business, the reverend traders have a most lucrative branch

of commerce from which other merchants are excluded. The sale of

absolutions was the source of large fortunes to the priests. The enormous

impudence of this traffic almost exceeds belief. Throughout the

Netherlands, the price current of the wares thus offered for sale, was

published in every town and village. God's pardon for crimes already

committed, or about to be committed, was advertised according to a

graduated tariff. Thus, poisoning, for example, was absolved for eleven

ducats, six livres tournois. Absolution for incest was afforded at

thirty-six livres, three ducats. Perjury came to seven livres and three

carlines. Pardon for murder, if not by poison, was cheaper. Even a

parricide could buy forgiveness at God's tribunal at one ducat; four

livres, eight carlines. Henry de Montfort, in the year 1448, purchased

absolution for that crime at that price. Was it strange that a century or

so of this kind of work should produce a Luther? Was it unnatural that

plain people, who loved the ancient Church, should rather desire to see

her purged of such blasphemous abuses, than to hear of St. Peter's dome

rising 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 no

longer able to protect itself against the secular aim. The halcyon days

of ban, book and candle, are gone. In 1459, Duke Philip of Burgundy

prohibits the churches from affording protection to fugitives. Charles

the Bold, in whose eyes nothing is sacred save war and the means of

making it, lays a heavy impost upon all clerical property. Upon being

resisted, he enforces collection with the armed hand. The sword and the

pen, strength and intellect, no longer the exclusive servants or

instruments of priestcraft, are both in open revolt. Charles the Bold

storms one fortress, Doctor Grandfort, of Groningen, batters another.

This learned Frisian, called "the light of the world," friend and

compatriot of the great Rudolph Agricola, preaches throughout the

provinces, uttering bold denunciations of ecclesiastical error. He even

disputes the infallibility of the Pope, denies the utility of prayers for

the dead, and inveighs against the whole doctrine of purgatory and

absolution.

With the beginning of the 16th century, the great Reformation was

actually alive. The name of Erasmus of Rotterdam was already celebrated;

the man, who, according to Grotius, "so well showed the road to a

reasonable reformation." But if Erasmus showed the road, he certainly did

not travel far upon it himself. Perpetual type of the quietist, the

moderate man, he censured the errors of the Church with discrimination

and gentleness, as if Borgianism had not been too long rampant at Rome,

as if men's minds throughout Christendom were not too deeply stirred to

be satisfied with mild rebukes against sin, especially when the mild

rebuker was in receipt of livings and salaries from the sinner. Instead

of rebukes, the age wanted reforms. The Sage of Rotterdam was a keen

observer, a shrewd satirist, but a moderate moralist. He loved ease, good

company, the soft repose of princely palaces, better than a life of

martyrdom and a death at the stake. He was not of the stuff of which

martyrs are made, as he handsomely confessed on more than one occasion.

"Let others affect martyrdom," he said, "for myself I am unworthy of the

honor;" and, at another time, "I am not of a mind," he observed "to

venture my life for the truth's sake; all men have not strength to endure

the martyr's death. For myself, if it came to the point, I should do no

better than Simon Peter." Moderate in all things, he would have liked, he

said, to live without eating and drinking, although he never found it

convenient to do so, and he rejoiced when advancing age diminished his

tendency to other carnal pleasures in which he had moderately indulged.

Although awake to the abuses of the Church, he thought Luther going too

fast and too far. He began by applauding ended by censuring the monk of

Wittemberg. The Reformation might have been delayed for centuries had

Erasmus and other moderate men been the only reformers. He will long be

honored for his elegant, Latinity. In the republic of letters, his

efforts to infuse a pure taste, a sound criticism, a love for the

beautiful and the classic, in place of the owlish pedantry which had so

long flapped and hooted through mediveval cloisters, will always be held

in grateful reverence. In the history of the religious Reformation, his

name seems hardly to deserve the commendations of Grotius.

As the schism yawns, more and more ominously, throughout Christendom, the

Emperor naturally trembles. Anxious to save the state, but being no

antique Roman, he wishes to close the gulf, but with more convenience to

himself: He conceives the highly original plan of combining Church and

Empire under one crown. This is Maximilian's scheme for Church

reformation. An hereditary papacy, a perpetual pope-emperor, the

Charlemagne and Hildebrand systems united and simplified--thus the world

may yet be saved. "Nothing more honorable, nobler, better, could happen

to us," writes Maximilian to Paul Lichtenstein (16th Sept. 1511), "than

to re-annex the said popedom--which properly belongs to us--to our

Empire. Cardinal Adrian approves our reasons and encourages us to

proceed, being of opinion that we should not have much trouble with the

cardinals. It is much to be feared that the Pope may die of his present

sickness. He has lost his appetite, and fills himself with so much drink

that his health is destroyed. As such matters can not be arranged without

money, we have promised the cardinals, whom we expect to bring over,

300,000 ducats, [Recall that the fine for redemption and pardon for the

sin of murder was at that time one ducat. D.W.] which we shall raise from

the Fuggers, and make payable in Rome upon the appointed day."

These business-like arrangements he communicates, two days afterwards, in

a secret letter to his daughter Margaret, and already exults at his

future eminence, both in this world and the next. "We are sending

Monsieur de Gurce," he says; "to make an agreement with the Pope, that we

may be taken as coadjutor, in order that, upon his death, we may be sure

of the papacy, and, afterwards, of becoming a saint. After my decease,

therefore, you will be constrained to adore me, of which I shall be very

proud. I am beginning to work upon the cardinals, in which affair two or

three hundred thousand ducats will be of great service." The letter was

signed, "From the hand of your good father, Maximilian, future Pope."

These intrigues are not destined, however, to be successful. Pope Julius

lives two years longer; Leo the Tenth succeeds; and, as Medici are not

much prone to Church reformation some other scheme, and perhaps some

other reformer, may be wanted. Meantime, the traffic in bulls of

absolution becomes more horrible than ever. Money must be raised to

supply the magnificent extravagance of Rome. Accordingly, Christians,

throughout Europe, are offered by papal authority, guarantees of

forgiveness for every imaginable sin, "even for the rape of God's mother,

if that were possible," together with a promise of life eternal in

Paradise, all upon payment of the price affixed to each crime. The

Netherlands, like other countries, are districted and farmed for the

collection of this papal revenue. Much of the money thus raised, remains

in the hands of the vile collectors. Sincere Catholics, who love and

honor the ancient religion, shrink with horror at the spectacle offered

on every side. Criminals buying Paradise for money, monks spending the

money thus paid in gaming houses, taverns, and brothels; this seems, to

those who have studied their Testaments, a different scheme of salvation

from the one promulgated by Christ. There has evidently been a departure

from the system of earlier apostles. Innocent conservative souls are much

perplexed; but, at last, all these infamies arouse a giant to do battle

with the giant wrong. Martin Luther enters the lists, all alone, armed

only with a quiver filled with ninety-five propositions, and a bow which

can send them all over Christendom with incredible swiftness. Within a

few weeks the ninety-five propositions have flown through Germany, the

Netherlands, Spain, and are found in Jerusalem.

At the beginning, Erasmus encourages the bold friar. So long as the axe

is not laid at the foot of the tree, which bears the poisonous but golden

fruit, the moderate man applauds the blows. "Luther's cause is considered

odious," writes Erasmus to the Elector of Saxony, "because he has, at the

same 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 not

with arguments. He foresees that the work will have a bloody and

turbulent result, but imputes the principal blame to the clergy. "The

priests talk," said he, "of absolution in such terms, that laymen can not

stomach it. Luther has been for nothing more censured than for making

little of Thomas Aquinas; for wishing to diminish the absolution traffic;

for having a low opinion of mendicant orders, and for respecting

scholastic opinions less than the gospels. All this is considered

intolerable heresy."

Erasmus, however, was offending both parties. A swarm of monks were

already buzzing about him for the bold language of his Commentaries and

Dialogues. He was called Erasmus for his errors--Arasmus because he would

plough up sacred things--Erasinus because he had written himself an

ass--Behemoth, Antichrist, and many other names of similar import. Luther

was said to have bought the deadly seed in his barn. The egg had been

laid by Erasmus, hatched by Luther. On the other hand, he was reviled for

not taking side manfully with the reformer. The moderate man received

much denunciation from zealots on either side. He soon clears himself,

however, from all suspicions of Lutheranism. He is appalled at the fierce

conflict which rages far and wide. He becomes querulous as the mighty

besom sweeps away sacred dust and consecrated cobwebs. "Men should not

attempt every thing at once," he writes, "but rather step by step. That

which men can not improve they must look at through the fingers. If the

godlessness of mankind requires such fierce physicians as Luther, if man

can not be healed with soothing ointments and cooling drinks, let us hope

that God will comfort, as repentant, those whom he has punished as

rebellious. If the dove of Christ--not the owl of Minerva--would only fly

to us, some measure might be put to the madness of mankind."

Meantime the man, whose talk is not of doves and owls, the fierce

physician, who deals not with ointments and cooling draughts, strides

past the crowd of gentle quacks to smite the foul disease. Devils,

thicker than tiles on house-tops, scare him not from his work. Bans and

bulls, excommunications and decrees, are rained upon his head. The

paternal Emperor sends down dire edicts, thicker than hail upon the

earth. The Holy Father blasts and raves from Rome. Louvain doctors

denounce, Louvain hangmen burn, the bitter, blasphemous books. The

immoderate man stands firm in the storm, demanding argument instead of

illogical thunder; shows the hangmen and the people too, outside the

Elster gate at Wittenberg, that papal bulls will blaze as merrily as

heretic scrolls. What need of allusion to events which changed the

world--which every child has learned--to the war of Titans, uprooting of

hoary trees and rock-ribbed hills, to the Worms diet, Peasant wars, the

Patmos of Eisenach, and huge wrestlings with the Devil?

Imperial edicts are soon employed to suppress the Reformation in the

Netherlands by force. The provinces, unfortunately; are the private

property of Charles, his paternal inheritance; and most paternally,

according to his view of the matter, does he deal with them. Germany can

not 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 a

devil under the form of a man, and clothed in the dress of a priest, the

better to bring the human race to hell and damnation, therefore all his

disciples and converts are to be punished with death and forfeiture of

all their goods." This was succinct and intelligible. The bloody edict,

issued at Worms, without even a pretence of sanction by the estates, was

carried into immediate effect. The papal inquisition was introduced into

the provinces to assist its operations. The bloody work, for which the

reign of Charles is mainly distinguished in the Netherlands, now began.

In 1523, July 1st, two Augustine monks were burned at Brussels, the first

victims to Lutheranism in the provinces. Erasmus observed, with a sigh,

that "two had been burned at Brussels, and that the city now began

strenuously to favor Lutheranism."

Pope Adrian the Sixth, the Netherland boat-maker's son and the Emperor's

ancient tutor, was sufficiently alive to the sins of churchmen. The

humble scholar of Utrecht was, at least, no Borgia. At the diet of

Nuremberg, summoned to put down Luther, the honest Pope declared roundly,

through the Bishop of Fabriane, that "these disorders had sprung from the

Sins of men, more especially from the sins of priests and prelates. Even

in the holy chair," said he, "many horrible crimes have been committed.

Many abuses have grown up in the ecclesiastical state. The contagious

disease, spreading from the head to the members--from the Pope to lesser

prelates--has spread far and wide, so that scarcely any one is to be

found who does right, and who is free from infection. Nevertheless, the

evils have become so ancient and manifold, that it will be necessary to

go step by step."

In those passionate days, the ardent reformers were as much outraged by

this pregnant confession as the ecclesiastics. It would indeed be a slow

process, they thought, to move step by step in the Reformation, if

between each step, a whole century was to intervene. In vain did the

gentle pontiff call upon Erasmus to assuage the stormy sea with his

smooth rhetoric. The Sage of Rotterdam was old and sickly; his day was

over. Adrian's head; too; languishes beneath the triple crown but twenty

months. He dies 13th Sept., 1523, having arrived at the conviction,

according to his epitaph, that the greatest misfortune of his life was to

have reigned.

Another edict, published in the Netherlands, forbids all private

assemblies for devotion; all reading of the scriptures; all discussions

within one's own doors concerning faith, the sacraments, the papal

authority, or other religious matter, under penalty of death. The edicts

were no dead letter. The fires were kept constantly supplied with human

fuel by monks, who knew the art of burning reformers better than that of

arguing 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 the

scriptures in private or public. At the same time, the violent personal

altercation between Luther and Erasmus, upon predestination, together

with the bitter dispute between Luther and Zwingli concerning the real

presence, did more to impede the progress of the Reformation than ban or

edict, sword or fire. The spirit of humanity hung her head, finding that

the bold reformer had only a new dogma in place of the old ones, seeing

that dissenters, in their turn, were sometimes as ready as papists, with

age, fagot, and excommunication. In 1526, Felix Mants, the anabaptist, is

drowned at Zurich, in obedience to Zwingli's pithy formula--'Qui iterum

mergit mergatur'. Thus the anabaptists, upon their first appearance, were

exposed to the fires of the Church and the water of the Zwinglians.

There is no doubt that the anabaptist delusion was so ridiculous and so

loathsome, as to palliate or at least render intelligible the wrath with

which they were regarded by all parties. The turbulence of the sect was

alarming to constituted authorities, its bestiality disgraceful to the

cause of religious reformation. The leaders were among the most depraved

of human creatures, as much distinguished for licentiousness, blasphemy

and cruelty as their followers for grovelling superstition. The evil

spirit, driven out of Luther, seemed, in orthodox eyes, to have taken

possession of a herd of swine. The Germans, Muncer and Hoffmann, had been

succeeded, as chief prophets, by a Dutch baker, named Matthiszoon, of

Harlem; who announced himself as Enoch. Chief of this man's disciples was

the notorious John Boccold, of Leyden. Under the government of this

prophet, the anabaptists mastered the city of Munster. Here they

confiscated property, plundered churches, violated females, murdered men

who refused to join the gang, and, in briefs practised all the enormities

which humanity alone can conceive or perpetrate. The prophet proclaimed

himself King of Sion, and sent out apostles to preach his doctrines in

Germany and the Netherlands. Polygamy being a leading article of the

system, he exemplified the principle by marrying fourteen wives. Of

these, the beautiful widow of Matthiszoon was chief, was called the Queen

of Sion, and wore a golden crown. The prophet made many fruitless efforts

to seize Amsterdam and Leyden. The armed invasion of the anabaptists was

repelled, but their contagious madness spread. The plague broke forth in

Amsterdam. On a cold winter's night, (February, 1535), seven men and five

women, inspired by the Holy Ghost, threw off their clothes and rushed

naked and raving through the streets, shrieking "Wo, wo, wo! the wrath of

God, the wrath of God!" When arrested, they obstinately refused to put on

clothing. "We are," they observed, "the naked truth." In a day or two,

these furious lunatics, who certainly deserved a madhouse rather than the

scaffold, were all executed. The numbers of the sect increased with the

martyrdom to which they were exposed, and the disorder spread to every

part of the Netherlands. Many were put to death in lingering torments,

but no perceptible effect was produced by the chastisement. Meantime the

great chief of the sect, the prophet John, was defeated by the forces of

the Bishop of Munster, who recovered his city and caused the "King of

Zion" to be pinched to death with red-hot tongs.

Unfortunately the severity of government was not wreaked alone upon the

prophet and his mischievous crew. Thousands and ten-thousands of

virtuous, well-disposed men and women, who had as little sympathy with

anabaptistical as with Roman depravity; were butchered in cold blood,

under the sanguinary rule of Charles, in the Netherlands. In 1533, Queen

Dowager Mary of Hungary, sister of the Emperor, Regent of the provinces,

the "Christian widow" admired by Erasmus, wrote to her brother that "in

her opinion all heretics, whether repentant or not, should be prosecuted

with such severity as that error might be, at once, extinguished, care

being only taken that the provinces were not entirely depopulated." With

this humane limitation, the "Christian Widow" cheerfully set herself to

superintend as foul and wholesale a system of murder as was ever

organized. In 1535, an imperial edict was issued at Brussels, condemning

all heretics to death; repentant males to be executed with the sword,

repentant females to be buried alive, the obstinate, of both sexes, to be

burned. This and similar edicts were the law of the land for twenty

years, and rigidly enforced. Imperial and papal persecution continued its

daily deadly work with such diligence as to make it doubtful whether the

limits set by the Regent Mary might not be overstepped. In the midst of

the carnage, the Emperor sent for his son Philip, that he might receive

the 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 most

severe provisions. Thus stood religious matters in the Netherlands at the

epoch of the imperial abdication.

XIII.

The civil institutions of the country had assumed their last provincial

form, in the Burgundo-Austrian epoch. As already stated, their tendency,

at a later period a vicious one, was to substitute fictitious personages

for men. A chain of corporations was wound about the liberty of the

Netherlands; yet that liberty had been originally sustained by the system

in which it, one day, might be strangled. The spirit of local

self-government, always the life-blood of liberty, was often excessive in

its manifestations. The centrifugal force had been too much developed,

and, combining with the mutual jealousy of corporations, had often made

the nation weak against a common foe. Instead of popular rights there

were state rights, for the large cities, with extensive districts and

villages under their government, were rather petty states than

municipalities. Although the supreme legislative and executive functions

belonged 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 its

own authority and confirmed by the prince. Thus a large portion, at

least, of the nation shared practically in the legislative functions,

which, technically, it did not claim; nor had the requirements of society

made constant legislation so necessary, as that to exclude the people

from the work was to enslave the country. There was popular power enough

to effect much good, but it was widely scattered, and, at the same time,

confined in artificial forms. The guilds were vassals of the towns, the

towns, 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 be

invented, It was a privilege, not a right, to exercise a handiwork, or to

participate in the action of government. Yet the mass of privileges was

so large, the shareholders so numerous, that practically the towns were

republics. The government was in the hands of a large number of the

people. Industry and intelligence led to wealth and power. This was great

progress from the general servitude of the 11th and 12th centuries, an

immense barrier against arbitrary rule. Loftier ideas of human rights,

larger conceptions of commerce, have taught mankind, in later days, the

difference between liberties and liberty, between guilds and free

competition. At the same time it was the principle of mercantile

association, in the middle ages, which protected the infant steps of

human freedom and human industry against violence and wrong. Moreover, at

this period, the tree of municipal life was still green and vigorous. The

healthful flow of sap from the humblest roots to the most verdurous

branches indicated the internal soundness of the core, and provided for

the constant development of exterior strength. The road to political

influence was open to all, not by right of birth, but through honorable

exertion 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 had

withered with the revolution in commerce. At the South, the splendid

marble channels, through which the overland India trade had been

conducted 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 convenient

river, stretched its arm to the ocean and caught the golden prize, as it

fell from its sister cities' grasp. The city was so ancient that its

genealogists, with ridiculous gravity, ascended to a period two centuries

before the Trojan war, and discovered a giant, rejoicing in the classic

name of Antigonus, established on the Scheld. This patriarch exacted one

half the merchandise of all navigators who passed his castle, and was

accustomed to amputate and cast into the river the right hands of those

who infringed this simple tariff. Thus Hand-werpen, hand-throwing, became

Antwerp, and hence, two hands, in the escutcheon of the city, were ever

held up in heraldic attestation of the truth. The giant was, in his turn,

thrown into the Scheld by a hero, named Brabo, from whose exploits

Brabant derived its name; "de quo Brabonica tellus." But for these

antiquarian researches, a simpler derivation of the name would seem

an t' werf, "on the wharf." It had now become the principal entrepot and

exchange of Europe. The Huggers, Velsens, Ostetts, of Germany, the

Gualterotti and Bonvisi of Italy, and many other great mercantile houses

were there established. No city, except Paris, surpassed it in

population, none approached it in commercial splendor. Its government was

very free. The sovereign, as Marquis of Antwerp, was solemnly sworn to

govern according to the ancient charters and laws. The stadholder, as his

representative, shared his authority with the four estates of the city.

The Senate of eighteen members was appointed by the stadholder out of a

quadruple number nominated by the Senate itself and by the fourth body,

called the Borgery. Half the board was thus renewed annually. It

exercised executive and appellate judicial functions, appointed two

burgomasters, and two pensionaries or legal councillors, and also

selected the lesser magistrates and officials of the city. The board of

ancients or ex-senators, held their seats ex officio. The twenty-six

ward-masters, appointed, two from each ward, by the Senate on nomination

by the wards, formed the third estate. Their especial business was to

enrol the militia and to attend to its mustering and training. The deans

of the guilds, fifty-four in number, two from each guild, selected by the

Senate, from a triple list of candidates presented by the guilds,

composed the fourth estate. This influential body was always assembled in

the broad-council of the city. Their duty was likewise to conduct the

examination of candidates claiming admittance to any guild and offering

specimens of art or handiwork, to superintend the general affairs of the

guilds and to regulate disputes.

There were also two important functionaries, representing the king in

criminal and civil matters. The Vicarius capitalis, Scultetus, Schout,

Sheriff, or Margrave, took precedence of all magistrates. His business

was to superintend criminal arrests, trials, and executions. The Vicarius

civilis was called the Amman, and his office corresponded with that of

the Podesta in the Frisian and Italian republics. His duties were nearly

similar, in civil, to those of his colleague, in criminal matters.

These four branches, with their functionaries and dependents, composed

the commonwealth of Antwerp. Assembled together in council, they

constituted the great and general court. No tax could be imposed by the

sovereign, except with consent of the four branches, all voting

separately.

The personal and domiciliary rights of the citizen were scrupulously

guarded. The Schout could only make arrests with the Burgomaster's

warrant, and was obliged to bring the accused, within three days, before

the 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 were

excellent and cheap. It was difficult to find a child of sufficient age

who could not read, write, and speak, at least, two languages. The sons

of 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 a

plain along the banks of the Scheld, shaped like a bent bow with the

river for its string, it enclosed within it walls some of the most

splendid edifices in Christendom. The world-renowned church of Notre

Dame, the stately Exchange where five thousand merchants daily

congregated, prototype of all similar establishments throughout the

world, the capacious mole and port where twenty-five hundred vessels were

often seen at once, and where five hundred made their daily entrance or

departure, were all establishments which it would have been difficult to

rival in any other part of the world.

From what has already been said of the municipal institutions of the

country, it may be inferred that the powers of the Estates-general were

limited. The members of that congress were not representatives chosen by

the people, but merely a few ambassadors from individual provinces. This

individuality was not always composed of the same ingredients. Thus,

Holland consisted of two members, or branches--the nobles and the six

chief 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 of

nobility or clergy; Zeland, of one clerical person, the abbot of

Middelburg, one noble, the Marquis of Veer and Vliessingen, and six chief

cities; Utrecht, of three branches--the nobility, the clergy, and five

cities. These, and other provinces, constituted in similar manner, were

supposed to be actually present at the diet when assembled. The chief

business of the states-general was financial; the sovereign, or his

stadholder, only obtaining supplies by making a request in person, while

any single city, as branch of a province, had a right to refuse the

grant.

Education had felt the onward movement of the country and the times. The

whole system was, however, pervaded by the monastic spirit, which had

originally preserved all learning from annihilation, but which now kept

it wrapped in the ancient cerecloths, and stiffening in the stony

sarcophagus of a bygone age. The university of Louvain was the chief

literary institution in the provinces. It had been established in 1423 by

Duke John IV. of Brabant. Its government consisted of a President and

Senate, forming a close corporation, which had received from the founder

all his own authority, and the right to supply their own vacancies. The

five faculties of law, canon law, medicine, theology, and the arts, were

cultivated at the institution. There was, besides, a high school for

under graduates, divided into four classes. The place reeked with

pedantry, and the character of the university naturally diffused itself

through other scholastic establishments. Nevertheless, it had done and

was doing much to preserve the love for profound learning, while the

rapidly advancing spirit of commerce was attended by an ever increasing

train 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 the

wealthier classes enjoyed great facilities for education in all the great

capitals. The classics, music, and the modern languages, particularly the

French, were universally cultivated. Nor was intellectual cultivation

confined to the higher orders. On the contrary, it was diffused to a

remarkable degree among the hard-working artisans and handicraftsmen of

the great cities.

For the principle of association had not confined itself exclusively to

politics and trade. Besides the numerous guilds by which citizenship was

acquired in the various cities, were many other societies for mutual

improvement, support, or recreation. The great secret, architectural or

masonic brotherhood of Germany, that league to which the artistic and

patient completion of the magnificent works of Gothic architecture in the

middle ages is mainly to be attributed, had its branches in nether

Germany, and explains the presence of so many splendid and elaborately

finished churches in the provinces. There were also military sodalities

of musketeers, cross-bowmen, archers, swordsmen in every town. Once a

year these clubs kept holiday, choosing a king, who was selected for his

prowess and skill in the use of various weapons. These festivals, always

held with great solemnity and rejoicing, were accompanied bye many

exhibitions of archery and swordsmanship. The people were not likely,

therefore, voluntarily to abandon that privilege and duty of freemen, the

right to bear arms, and the power to handle them.

Another and most important collection of brotherhoods were the so-called

guilds of Rhetoric, which existed, in greater or less number, in all the

principal cities. These were associations of mechanics, for the purpose

of amusing their leisure with poetical effusions, dramatic and musical

exhibitions, theatrical processions, and other harmless and not inelegant

recreations. Such chambers of rhetoric came originally in the fifteenth

century from France. The fact that in their very title they confounded

rhetoric with poetry and the drama indicates the meagre attainments of

these early "Rederykers." In the outset of their career they gave

theatrical exhibitions. "King Herod and his Deeds" was enacted in the

cathedral at Utrecht in 1418. The associations spread with great celerity

throughout the Netherlands, and, as they were all connected with each

other, and in habits of periodical intercourse, these humble links of

literature were of great value in drawing the people of the provinces

into closer union. They became, likewise, important political engines. As

early as the time of Philip the Good, their songs and lampoons became so

offensive to the arbitrary notions of the Burgundian government, as to

cause the societies to be prohibited. It was, however, out of the

sovereign's power permanently to suppress institutions, which already

partook of the character of the modern periodical press combined with

functions resembling the show and licence of the Athenian drama. Viewed

from the stand-point of literary criticism their productions were not

very commendable in taste, conception, or execution. To torture the Muses

to madness, to wire-draw poetry through inextricable coils of difficult

rhymes and impossible measures; to hammer one golden grain of wit into a

sheet of infinite platitude, with frightful ingenuity to construct

ponderous anagrams and preternatural acrostics, to dazzle the vulgar eye

with tawdry costumes, and to tickle the vulgar ear with virulent

personalities, were tendencies which perhaps smacked of the hammer, the

yard-stick and the pincers, and gave sufficient proof, had proof been

necessary, that literature is not one of the mechanical arts, and that

poetry can not be manufactured to a profit by joint stock companies. Yet,

if the style of these lucubrations was often depraved, the artisans

rarely received a better example from the literary institutions above

them. It was not for guilds of mechanics to give the tone to literature,

nor were their efforts in more execrable taste than the emanations from

the pedants of Louvain. The "Rhetoricians" are not responsible for all

the bad taste of their generation. The gravest historians of the

Netherlands often relieved their elephantine labors by the most asinine

gambols, and it was not to be expected that these bustling weavers and

cutlers 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 bodies

of recognized importance. The rhetorical chambers existed in the most

obscure villages. The number of yards of Flemish poetry annually

manufactured and consumed throughout the provinces almost exceed belief.

The societies had regular constitutions. Their presiding officers were

called kings, princes, captains, archdeacons, or rejoiced in similar

high-sounding names. Each chamber had its treasurer, its buffoon, and its

standard-bearer for public processions. Each had its peculiar title or

blazon, as the Lily, the Marigold, or the Violet, with an appropriate

motto. By the year 1493, the associations had become so important, that

Philip the Fair summoned them all to a general assembly at Mechlin. Here

they were organized, and formally incorporated under the general

supervision of an upper or mother-society of Rhetoric, consisting of

fifteen members, and called by the title of "Jesus with the balsam

flower."

The sovereigns were always anxious to conciliate these influential guilds

by becoming members of them in person. Like the players, the Rhetoricians

were the brief abstract and chronicle of the time, and neither prince nor

private person desired their ill report. It had, indeed, been Philip's

intention to convert them into engines for the arbitrary purposes of his

house, but fortunately the publicly organized societies were not the only

chambers. On the contrary, the unchartered guilds were the moat numerous

and influential. They exercised a vast influence upon the progress of the

religious reformation, and the subsequent revolt of the Netherlands. They

ridiculed, with their farces and their satires, the vices of the clergy.

They dramatized tyranny for public execration. It was also not

surprising, that among the leaders of the wild anabaptists who disgraced

the great revolution in church and state by their hideous antics, should

be found many who, like David of Delft, John of Leyden, and others, had

been members of rhetorical chambers. The genius for mummery and

theatrical exhibitions, transplanted from its sphere, and exerting itself

for purposes of fraud and licentiousness, was as baleful in its effects

as it was healthy in its original manifestations. Such exhibitions were

but the excrescences of a system which had borne good fruit. These

literary guilds befitted and denoted a people which was alive, a people

which had neither sunk to sleep in the lap of material prosperity, nor

abased itself in the sty of ignorance and political servitude. The spirit

of liberty pervaded these rude but not illiterate assemblies, and her

fair proportions were distinctly visible, even through the somewhat

grotesque garb which she thus assumed.

The great leading recreations which these chambers afforded to themselves

and the public, were the periodic jubilees which they celebrated in

various capital cities. All the guilds of rhetoric throughout the

Netherlands were then invited to partake and to compete in magnificent

processions, brilliant costumes, living pictures, charades, and other

animated, glittering groups, and in trials of dramatic and poetic skill,

all arranged under the superintendence of the particular association

which, in the preceding year, had borne away the prize. Such jubilees

were called "Land jewels."

From the amusements of a people may be gathered much that is necessary

for a proper estimation of its character. No unfavorable opinion can be

formed as to the culture of a nation, whose weavers, smiths, gardeners,

and traders, found the favorite amusement of their holidays in composing

and enacting tragedies or farces, reciting their own verses, or in

personifying moral and esthetic sentiments by ingeniously-arranged

groups, or gorgeous habiliments. The cramoisy velvets and yellow satin

doublets of the court, the gold-brocaded mantles of priests and princes

are often but vulgar drapery of little historic worth. Such costumes

thrown around the swart figures of hard-working artisans, for literary

and artistic purposes, have a real significance, and are worthy of a

closer examination. Were not these amusements of the Netherlanders as

elevated and humanizing as the contemporary bull-fights and autos-da-fe

of Spain? What place in history does the gloomy bigot merit who, for the

love of Christ, converted all these gay cities into shambles, and changed

the glittering processions of their Land jewels into fettered marches to

the scaffold?

Thus fifteen ages have passed away, and in the place of a horde of

savages, living among swamps and thickets, swarm three millions of

people, the most industrious, the most prosperous, perhaps the most

intelligent under the sun. Their cattle, grazing on the bottom of the

sea, are the finest in Europe, their agricultural products of more

exchangeable value than if nature had made their land to overflow with

wine and oil. Their navigators are the boldest, their mercantile marine

the most powerful, their merchants the most enterprising in the world.

Holland and Flanders, peopled by one race, vie with each other in the

pursuits of civilization. The Flemish skill in the mechanical and in the

fine arts is unrivalled. Belgian musicians delight and instruct other

nations, Belgian pencils have, for a century, caused the canvas to glow

with colors and combinations never seen before. Flemish fabrics are

exported to all parts of Europe, to the East and West Indies, to Africa.

The splendid tapestries, silks, linens, as well as the more homely and

useful manufactures of the Netherlands, are prized throughout the world.

Most ingenious, as they had already been described by the keen-eyed

Caesar, in imitating the arts of other nations, the skillful artificers

of the country at Louvain, Ghent, and other places, reproduce the shawls

and silks of India with admirable accuracy.

Their national industry was untiring; their prosperity unexampled; their

love of liberty indomitable; their pugnacity proverbial. Peaceful in

their pursuits, phlegmatic by temperament, the Netherlands were yet the

most belligerent and excitable population of Europe. Two centuries of

civil war had but thinned the ranks of each generation without quenching

the 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 sexes

in the daily walks of life, and to travel on foot or horseback from one

town to another, without escort and without fear, they had acquired

manners more frank and independent than those of women in other lands,

while their morals were pure and their decorum undoubted. The prominent

part to be sustained by the women of Holland in many dramas of the

revolution would thus fitly devolve upon a class, enabled by nature and

education to conduct themselves with courage.

Within the little circle which encloses the seventeen provinces are 208

walled cities, many of them among the most stately in Christendom, 150

chartered towns, 6,300 villages, with their watch-towers and steeples,

besides numerous other more insignificant hamlets; the whole guarded by a

belt of sixty fortresses of surpassing strength.

XIV.

Thus in this rapid sketch of the course and development of the Netherland

nation during sixteen centuries, we have seen it ever marked by one

prevailing characteristic, one master passion--the love of liberty, the

instinct of self-government. Largely compounded of the bravest Teutonic

elements, Batavian and Frisian, the race ever battles to the death with

tyranny, organizes extensive revolts in the age of Vespasian, maintains a

partial 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 practical

recognition of the claims of humanity. With the advent of the Burgundian

family, the power of the commons has reached so high a point, that it is

able to measure itself, undaunted, with the spirit of arbitrary rule, of

which that engrossing and tyrannical house is the embodiment. For more

than a century the struggle for freedom, for civic life, goes on; Philip

the Good, Charles the Bold, Mary's husband Maximilian, Charles V., in

turn, 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 redoubled

energy. At last, in the 16th century, a new and more powerful spirit, the

genius of religious freedom, comes to participate in the great conflict.

Arbitrary power, incarnated in the second Charlemagne, assails the new

combination with unscrupulous, unforgiving fierceness. Venerable civic

magistrates; haltered, grovel in sackcloth and ashes; innocent, religious

reformers burn in holocausts. By the middle of the century, the battle

rages more fiercely than ever. In the little Netherland territory,

Humanity, bleeding but not killed, still stands at bay and defies the

hunters. The two great powers have been gathering strength for centuries.

They are soon to be matched in a longer and more determined combat than

the world had ever seen. The emperor is about to leave the stage. The

provinces, so passionate for nationality, for municipal freedom, for

religious reformation, are to become the property of an utter stranger; a

prince foreign to their blood, their tongue, their religion, their whole

habits of life and thought.

Such was the political, religious, and social condition of a nation who

were 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

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

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

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

1855

PHILIP THE SECOND IN THE NETHERLANDS

1555 [CHAPTER I.]

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 Netherlands

were assembled in the great hall of the palace at Brussels. They had been

summoned to be the witnesses and the guarantees of the abdication which

Charles V. had long before resolved upon, and which he was that day to

execute. The emperor, like many potentates before and since, was fond of

great political spectacles. He knew their influence upon the masses of

mankind. Although plain, even to shabbiness, in his own costume, and

usually attired in black, no one ever understood better than he how to

arrange such exhibitions in a striking and artistic style. We have seen

the theatrical and imposing manner in which he quelled the insurrection

at Ghent, and nearly crushed the life forever out of that vigorous and

turbulent little commonwealth. The closing scene of his long and

energetic reign he had now arranged with profound study, and with an

accurate knowledge of the manner in which the requisite effects were to

be produced. The termination of his own career, the opening of his

beloved Philip's, were to be dramatized in a manner worthy the august

character of the actors, and the importance of the great stage where they

played their parts. The eyes of the whole world were directed upon that

day towards Brussels; for an imperial abdication was an event which had

not, in the sixteenth century, been staled by custom.

The gay capital of Brabant--of that province which rejoiced in the

liberal constitution known by the cheerful title of the "joyful

entrance," was worthy to be the scene of the imposing show. Brussels had

been a city for more than five centuries, and, at that day, numbered

about one hundred thousand inhabitants. Its walls, six miles in

circumference, were already two hundred years old. Unlike most Netherland

cities, lying usually upon extensive plains, it was built along the sides

of an abrupt promontory. A wide expanse of living verdure, cultivated

gardens, shady groves, fertile cornfields, flowed round it like a sea.

The foot of the town was washed by the little river Senne, while the

irregular but picturesque streets rose up the steep sides of the hill

like the semicircles and stairways of an amphitheatre. Nearly in the

heart of the place rose the audacious and exquisitely embroidered tower

of the townhouse, three hundred and sixty-six feet in height, a miracle

of needlework in stone, rivalling in its intricate carving the cobweb

tracery of that lace which has for centuries been synonymous with the

city, and rearing itself above a facade of profusely decorated and

brocaded architecture. The crest of the elevation was crowned by the

towers of the old ducal palace of Brabant, with its extensive and

thickly-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 their

summer pilgrimages, and where the nobles chased the wild boar and the

stag, extended to within a quarter of a mile of the city walls. The

population, as thrifty, as intelligent, as prosperous as that of any city

in Europe, was divided into fifty-two guilds of artisans, among which the

most important were the armorers, whose suits of mail would turn a

musket-ball; the gardeners, upon whose gentler creations incredible sums

were annually lavished; and the tapestry-workers, whose gorgeous fabrics

were the wonder of the world. Seven principal churches, of which the most

striking was that of St. Gudule, with its twin towers, its charming

facade, and its magnificently painted windows, adorned the upper part of

the city. The number seven was a magic number in Brussels, and was

supposed at that epoch, during which astronomy was in its infancy and

astrology in its prime, to denote the seven planets which governed all

things terrestrial by their aspects and influences. Seven noble families,

springing from seven ancient castles, supplied the stock from which the

seven senators were selected who composed the upper council of the city.

There were seven great squares, seven city gates, and upon the occasion

of the present ceremony, it was observed by the lovers of wonderful

coincidences, that seven crowned heads would be congregated under a

single roof in the liberty-loving city.

The palace where the states-general were upon this occasion convened, had

been the residence of the Dukes of Brabant since the days of John the

Second, who had built it about the year 1300. It was a spacious and

convenient building, but not distinguished for the beauty of its

architecture. In front was a large open square, enclosed by an iron

railing; in the rear an extensive and beautiful park, filled with forest

trees, and containing gardens and labyrinths, fish-ponds and game

preserves, fountains and promenades, race-courses and archery grounds.

The main entrance to this edifice opened upon a spacious hall, connected

with a beautiful and symmetrical chapel. The hall was celebrated for its

size, harmonious proportions, and the richness of its decorations. It was

the place where the chapters of the famous order of the Golden Fleece

were held. Its walls were hung with a magnificent tapestry of Arran,

representing the life and achievements of Gideon, the Midianite, and

giving particular prominence to the miracle of the "fleece of wool,"

vouchsafed to that renowned champion, the great patron of the Knights of

the Fleece. On the present occasion there were various additional

embellishments of flowers and votive garlands. At the western end a

spacious platform or stage, with six or seven steps, had been

constructed, below which was a range of benches for the deputies of the

seventeen provinces. Upon the stage itself there were rows of seats,

covered with tapestry, upon the right hand and upon the left. These were

respectively to accommodate the knights of the order and the guests of

high distinction. In the rear of these were other benches, for the

members of the three great councils. In the centre of the stage was a

splendid canopy, decorated with the arms of Burgundy, beneath which were

placed 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. Numerous

representatives from all the states but two--Gelderland and

Overyssel--had already taken their places. Grave magistrates, in chain

and gown, and executive officers in the splendid civic uniforms for which

the Netherlands were celebrated, already filled every seat within the

apace allotted. The remainder of the hall was crowded with the more

favored portion of the multitude which had been fortunate enough to

procure admission to the exhibition. The archers and hallebardiers of the

body-guard kept watch at all the doors. The theatre was filled--the

audience was eager with expectation--the actors were yet to arrive. As

the clock struck three, the hero of the scene appeared. Caesar, as he was

always designated in the classic language of the day, entered, leaning on

the shoulder of William of Orange. They came from the chapel, and were

immediately followed by Philip the Second and Queen Mary of Hungary. The

Archduke Maximilian the Duke of Savoy, and other great personages came

afterwards, accompanied by a glittering throng of warriors, councillors,

governors, and Knights of the Fleece.

Many individuals of existing or future historic celebrity in the

Netherlands, whose names are so familiar to the student of the epoch,

seemed to have been grouped, as if by premeditated design, upon this

imposing platform, where the curtain was to fall forever upon the

mightiest emperor since Charlemagne, and where the opening scene of the

long and tremendous tragedy of Philip's reign was to be simultaneously

enacted. There was the Bishop of Arras, soon to be known throughout

Christendom by the more celebrated title of Cardinal Granvelle, the

serene and smiling priest whose subtle influence over the destinies of so

many individuals then present, and over the fortunes of the whole land,

was to be so extensive and so deadly. There was that flower of Flemish

chivalry, the lineal descendant of ancient Frisian kings, already

distinguished for his bravery in many fields, but not having yet won

those two remarkable victories which were soon to make the name of Egmont

like the sound of a trumpet throughout the whole country. Tall,

magnificent in costume, with dark flowing hair, soft brown eye, smooth

cheek, a slight moustache, and features of almost feminine delicacy; such

was 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--the

Marquis Berghen and the Lord of Montigny; the Baron Berlaymont, brave,

intensely loyal, insatiably greedy for office and wages, but who, at

least, never served but one party; the Duke of Arschot, who was to serve

all, essay to rule all, and to betray all--a splendid seignor,

magnificent in cramoisy velvet, but a poor creature, who traced his

pedigree from Adam, according to the family monumental inscriptions at

Louvain, but who was better known as grand-nephew of the emperor's famous

tutor, Chiebres; the bold, debauched Brederode, with handsome, reckless

face and turbulent demeanor; the infamous Noircarmes, whose name was to

be covered with eternal execration, for aping towards his own compatriots

and kindred as much of Alva's atrocities and avarice, as he was permitted

to exercise; the distinguished soldiers Meghen and Aremberg--these, with

many others whose deeds of arms were to become celebrated throughout

Europe, were all conspicuous in the brilliant crowd. There, too, was that

learned Frisian, President Viglius, crafty, plausible, adroit,

eloquent--a small, brisk man, with long yellow hair, glittering green

eyes, round, tumid, rosy cheeks, and flowing beard. Foremost among the

Spanish grandees, and close to Philip, stood the famous favorite, Ruy

Gomez, or as he was familiarly called "Re y Gomez" (King and Gomez), a

man 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 Prince

of Orange.

Such were a few only of the most prominent in that gay throng, whose

fortunes, in part, it will be our humble duty to narrate; how many of

them passing through all this glitter to a dark and mysterious

doom!--some to perish on public scaffolds, some by midnight

assassination; 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. The

benches at either end of the platform were accordingly filled with the

royal and princely personages invited, with the Fleece Knights, wearing

the insignia of their order, with the members of the three great

councils, and with the governors. The Emperor, the King, and the Queen of

Hungary, were left conspicuous in the centre of the scene. As the whole

object of the ceremony was to present an impressive exhibition, it is

worth our while to examine minutely the appearance of the two principal

characters.

Charles the Fifth was then fifty-five years and eight months old; but he

was already decrepit with premature old age. He was of about the middle

height, and had been athletic and well-proportioned. Broad in the

shoulders, deep in the chest, thin in the flank, very muscular in the

arms and legs, he had been able to match himself with all competitors in

the tourney and the ring, and to vanquish the bull with his own hand in

the favorite national amusement of Spain. He had been able in the field

to do the duty of captain and soldier, to endure fatigue and exposure,

and every privation except fasting. These personal advantages were now

departed. Crippled in hands, knees and legs, he supported himself with

difficulty upon a crutch, with the aid of, an attendant's shoulder. In

face he had always been extremely ugly, and time had certainly not

improved his physiognomy. His hair, once of a light color, was now white

with age, close-clipped and bristling; his beard was grey, coarse, and

shaggy. His forehead was spacious and commanding; the eye was dark blue,

with an expression both majestic and benignant. His nose was aquiline but

crooked. The lower part of his face was famous for its deformity. The

under lip, a Burgundian inheritance, as faithfully transmitted as the

duchy and county, was heavy and hanging; the lower jaw protruding so far

beyond the upper, that it was impossible for him to bring together the

few fragments of teeth which still remained, or to speak a whole sentence

in an intelligible voice. Eating and talking, occupations to which he was

always much addicted, were becoming daily more arduous, in consequence of

this original defect, which now seemed hardly human, but rather an

original deformity.

So much for the father. The son, Philip the Second, was a small, meagre

man, much below the middle height, with thin legs, a narrow chest, and

the 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 was

fain to win their favor by making certain attempts in the tournament, in

which his success was sufficiently problematical. "His body," says his

professed panegyrist, "was but a human cage, in which, however brief and

narrow, dwelt a soul to whose flight the immeasurable expanse of heaven

was too contracted." [Cabrera] The same wholesale admirer adds, that "his

aspect was so reverend, that rustics who met him alone in a wood, without

knowing him, bowed down with instinctive veneration." In face, he was the

living image of his father, having the same broad forehead, and blue eye,

with the same aquiline, but better proportioned, nose. In the lower part

of the countenance, the remarkable Burgundian deformity was likewise

reproduced. He had the same heavy, hanging lip, with a vast mouth, and

monstrously protruding lower jaw. His complexion was fair, his hair light

and thin, his beard yellow, short, and pointed. He had the aspect of a

Fleming, but the loftiness of a Spaniard. His demeanor in public was

still, silent, almost sepulchral. He looked habitually on the ground when

he conversed, was chary of speech, embarrassed, and even suffering in

manner. This was ascribed partly to a natural haughtiness which he had

occasionally endeavored to overcome, and partly to habitual pains in the

stomach, occasioned by his inordinate fondness for pastry. [Bodavaro]

Such was the personal appearance of the man who was about to receive into

his 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 triangularly

under the canopy, such of the audience as had seats provided for them,

now took their places, and the proceedings commenced. Philibert de

Bruxelles, a member of the privy council of the Netherlands, arose at the

emperor's command, and made a long oration. He spoke of the emperor's

warm affection for the provinces, as the land of his birth; of his deep

regret that his broken health and failing powers, both of body and mind,

compelled him to resign his sovereignty, and to seek relief for his

shattered frame in a more genial climate. Caesar's gout was then depicted

in energetic language, which must have cost him a twinge as he sat there

and listened to the councillor's eloquence. "'Tis a most truculent

executioner," said Philibert: "it invades the whole body, from the crown

of the head to the soles of the feet, leaving nothing untouched. It

contracts the nerves with intolerable anguish, it enters the bones, it

freezes the marrow, it converts the lubricating fluids of the joints into

chalk, it pauses not until, having exhausted and debilitated the whole

body, it has rendered all its necessary instruments useless, and

conquered 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 himself

obliged, as the councillor proceeded to inform his audience, to change

the scene of the contest from the humid air of Flanders to the warmer

atmosphere of Spain. He rejoiced, however, that his son was both vigorous

and experienced, and that his recent marriage with the Queen of England

had furnished the provinces with a most valuable alliance. He then again

referred to the emperor's boundless love for his subjects, and concluded

with a tremendous, but superfluous, exhortation to Philip on the

necessity of maintaining the Catholic religion in its purity. After this

long harangue, which has been fully reported by several historians who

were present at the ceremony, the councillor proceeded to read the deed

of cession, by which Philip, already sovereign of Sicily, Naples, Milan,

and titular King of England, France, and Jerusalem, now received all the

duchies, marquisates, earldoms, baronies, cities, towns, and castles of

the Burgundian property, including, of course, the seventeen Netherlands.

As De Bruxelles finished, there was a buzz of admiration throughout the

assembly, mingled with murmurs of regret, that in the present great

danger upon the frontiers from the belligerent King of France and his

warlike and restless nation, the provinces should be left without their

ancient and puissant defender. The emperor then rose to his feet. Leaning

on his crutch, he beckoned from his seat the personage upon whose arm he

had leaned as he entered the hall. A tall, handsome youth of twenty-two

came forward--a man whose name from that time forward, and as long as

history shall endure, has been, and will be, more familiar than any other

in the mouths of Netherlanders. At that day he had rather a southern than

a German or Flemish appearance. He had a Spanish cast of features, dark,

well chiselled, and symmetrical. His head was small and well placed upon

his shoulders. His hair was dark brown, as were also his moustache and

peaked beard. His forehead was lofty, spacious, and already prematurely

engraved with the anxious lines of thought. His eyes were full, brown,

well opened, and expressive of profound reflection. He was dressed in the

magnificent apparel for which the Netherlanders were celebrated above all

other nations, and which the ceremony rendered necessary. His presence

being considered indispensable at this great ceremony, he had been

summoned but recently from the camp on the frontier, where,

notwithstanding his youth, the emperor had appointed him to command his

army in chief against such antagonists as Admiral Coligny and the Due de

Nevers.

Thus supported upon his crutch and upon the shoulder of William of

Orange, the Emperor proceeded to address the states, by the aid of a

closely-written brief which he held in his hand. He reviewed rapidly the

progress of events from his seventeenth year up to that day. He spoke of

his nine expeditions into Germany, six to Spain, seven to Italy, four to

France, ten to the Netherlands, two to England, as many to Africa, and of

his eleven voyages by sea. He sketched his various wars, victories, and

treaties of peace, assuring his hearers that the welfare of his subjects

and the security of the Roman Catholic religion had ever been the leading

objects 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, his

love for dominion, his affection for his subjects, and his regard for

their interests, required his departure. Instead of a decrepit man with

one foot in the grave, he presented them with a sovereign in the prime of

life and the vigor of health. Turning toward Philip, he observed, that

for a dying father to bequeath so magnificent an empire to his son was a

deed worthy of gratitude, but that when the father thus descended to the

grave before his time, and by an anticipated and living burial sought to

provide for the welfare of his realms and the grandeur of his son, the

benefit thus conferred was surely far greater. He added, that the debt

would be paid to him and with usury, should Philip conduct himself in his

administration of the province with a wise and affectionate regard to

their true interests. Posterity would applaud his abdication, should his

son Prove worthy of his bounty; and that could only be by living in the

fear of God, and by maintaining law, justice, and the Catholic religion

in all their purity, as the true foundation of the realm. In conclusion,

he entreated the estates, and through them the nation, to render

obedience to their new prince, to maintain concord and to preserve

inviolate the Catholic faith; begging them, at the same time, to pardon

him all errors or offences which he might have committed towards them

during his reign, and assuring them that he should unceasingly remember

their obedience and affection in his every prayer to that Being to whom

the remainder of his life was to be dedicated.

Such brave words as these, so many vigorous asseverations of attempted

performance of duty, such fervent hopes expressed of a benign

administration in behalf of the son, could not but affect the

sensibilities of the audience, already excited and softened by the

impressive character of the whole display. Sobs were heard throughout

every portion of the hall, and tears poured profusely from every eye. The

Fleece Knights on the platform and the burghers in the background were

all melted with the same emotion. As for the Emperor himself, he sank

almost fainting upon his chair as he concluded his address. An ashy

paleness overspread his countenance, and he wept like a child. Even the

icy Philip was almost softened, as he rose to perform his part in the

ceremony. Dropping upon his knees before his father's feet, he reverently

kissed 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 Holy

Trinity. 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 sincere

compassion for the son on whose shoulders so heavy a weight had just

devolved, 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 and

his affection for his people. Turning to the orders, he signified his

regret that he was unable to address them either in the French or Flemish

language, and was therefore obliged to ask their attention to the Bishop

of Arras, who would act as his interpreter. Antony Perrenot accordingly

arose, and in smooth, fluent, and well-turned commonplaces, expressed at

great length the gratitude of Philip towards his father, with his firm

determination to walk in the path of duty, and to obey his father's

counsels and example in the future administration of the provinces. This

long address of the prelate was responded to at equal length by Jacob

Maas, member of the Council of Brabant, a man of great learning,

eloquence and prolixity, who had been selected to reply on behalf of the

states-general, and who now, in the name of these; bodies, accepted the

abdication in an elegant and complimentary harangue. Queen Mary of

Hungary, the "Christian widow" of Erasmus, and Regent of the Netherlands

during the past twenty-five years, then rose to resign her office, making

a brief address expressive of her affection for the people, her regrets

at leaving them, and her hopes that all errors which she might have

committed during her long administration would be forgiven her. Again the

redundant Maas responded, asserting in terms of fresh compliment and

elegance the uniform satisfaction of the provinces with her conduct

during her whole career.

The orations and replies having now been brought to a close, the ceremony

was terminated. The Emperor, leaning on the shoulders of the Prince of

Orange and of the Count de Buren, slowly left the hall, followed by

Philip, the Queen of Hungary, and the whole court; all in the same order

in which they had entered, and by the same passage into the chapel.

It is obvious that the drama had been completely successful. It had been

a scene where heroic self-sacrifice, touching confidence, ingenuous love

of duty, patriotism, and paternal affection upon one side; filial

reverence, with a solemn regard for public duty and the highest interests

of the people on the other, were supposed to be the predominant

sentiments. The happiness of the Netherlands was apparently the only

object contemplated in the great transaction. All had played well their

parts 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 stage

was drowned in tears. There is not the least doubt as to the genuine and

universal emotion which was excited throughout the assembly. "Caesar's

oration," 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 the

audience, attests that "most of the assembly were dissolved in tears;

uttering the while such sonorous sobs that they compelled his Caesarean

Majesty and the Queen to cry with them. My own face," he adds, "was

certainly quite wet." The English envoy, Sir John Mason, describing in a

despatch to his government the scene which he had just witnessed, paints

the same picture. "The Emperor," he said, "begged the forgiveness of his

subjects if he had ever unwittingly omitted the performance of any of his

duties towards them. And here," continues the envoy, "he broke into a

weeping, whereunto, besides the dolefulness of the matter, I think, he

was moche provoked by seeing the whole company to do the lyke before;

there beyng in myne opinion not one man in the whole assemblie, stranger

or another, that dewring the time of a good piece of his oration poured

not out as abundantly teares, some more, some lesse. And yet he prayed

them to beare with his imperfections, proceeding of his sickly age, and

of the mentioning of so tender a matter as the departing from such a sort

of dere and loving subjects."

And yet what was the Emperor Charles to the inhabitants of the

Netherlands that they should weep for him? His conduct towards them

during his whole career had been one of unmitigated oppression. What to

them were all these forty voyages by sea and land, these journeyings back

and forth from Friesland to Tunis, from Madrid to Vienna. What was it to

them that the imperial shuttle was thus industriously flying to and fro?

The fabric wrought was but the daily growing grandeur and splendor of his

imperial house; the looms were kept moving at the expense of their

hardly-earned treasure, and the woof was often dyed red in the blood of

his bravest subjects. The interests of the Netherlands had never been

even a secondary consideration with their master. He had fulfilled no

duty towards them, he had committed the gravest crimes against them. He

had regarded them merely as a treasury upon which to draw; while the sums

which he extorted were spent upon ceaseless and senseless wars, which

were of no more interest to them than if they had been waged in another

planet. Of five millions of gold annually, which he derived from all his

realms, two millions came from these industrious and opulent provinces,

while but a half million came from Spain and another half from the

Indies. The mines of wealth which had been opened by the hand of industry

in that slender territory of ancient morass and thicket, contributed four

times as much income to the imperial exchequer as all the boasted wealth

of Mexico and Peru. Yet the artisans, the farmers and the merchants, by

whom these riches were produced, were consulted about as much in the

expenditure of the imposts upon their industry as were the savages of

America as to the distribution of the mineral treasures of their soil.

The rivalry of the houses of Habsburg and Valois, this was the absorbing

theme, during the greater part of the reign which had just been so

dramatically terminated. To gain the empire over Francis, to leave to Don

Philip a richer heritage than the Dauphin could expect, were the great

motives of the unparalleled energy displayed by Charles during the longer

and the more successful portion of his career. To crush the Reformation

throughout his dominions, was his occupation afterward, till he abandoned

the field in despair. It was certainly not desirable for the

Netherlanders that they should be thus controlled by a man who forced

them to contribute so largely to the success of schemes, some of which

were at best indifferent, and others entirely odious to them. They paid

1,200,000 crowns a year regularly; they paid in five years an

extraordinary subsidy of eight millions of ducats, and the States were

roundly rebuked by the courtly representatives of their despot, if they

presumed to inquire into the objects of the appropriations, or to express

an interest in their judicious administration. Yet it maybe supposed to

have been a matter of indifference to them whether Francis or Charles had

won the day at Pavia, and it certainly was not a cause of triumph to the

daily increasing thousands of religious reformers in Holland and Flanders

that their brethren had been crushed by the Emperor at Muhlberg. But it

was not alone that he drained their treasure, and hampered their

industry. He was in constant conflict with their ancient and

dearly-bought political liberties. Like his ancestor Charles the Bold, he

was desirous of constructing a kingdom out of the provinces. He was

disposed to place all their separate and individual charters on a

procrustean bed, and shape them all into uniformity simply by reducing

the whole to a nullity. The difficulties in the way, the stout opposition

offered by burghers, whose fathers had gained these charters with their

blood, and his want of leisure during the vast labors which devolved upon

him as the autocrat of so large a portion of the world, caused him to

defer indefinitely the execution of his plan. He found time only to crush

some of the foremost of the liberal institutions of the provinces, in

detail. He found the city of Tournay a happy, thriving, self-governed

little republic in all its local affairs; he destroyed its liberties,

without a tolerable pretext, and reduced it to the condition of a Spanish

or Italian provincial town.

His memorable chastisement of Ghent for having dared to assert its

ancient rights of self-taxation, is sufficiently known to the world, and

has been already narrated at length. Many other instances might be

adduced, if it were not a superfluous task, to prove that Charles was not

only a political despot, but most arbitrary and cruel in the exercise of

his despotism.

But if his sins against the Netherlands had been only those of financial

and political oppression, it would be at least conceivable, although

certainly not commendable, that the inhabitants should have regretted his

departure. But there are far darker crimes for which he stands arraigned

at the bar of history, and it is indeed strange that the man who had

committed them should have been permitted to speak his farewell amid

blended plaudits and tears. His hand planted the inquisition in the

Netherlands. Before his day it is idle to say that the diabolical

institution ever had a place there. The isolated cases in which

inquisitors had exercised functions proved the absence and not the

presence of the system, and will be discussed in a later chapter. Charles

introduced and organized a papal inquisition, side by side with those

terrible "placards" of his invention, which constituted a masked

inquisition even more cruel than that of Spain. The execution of the

system was never permitted to languish. The number of Netherlanders who

were burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive, in obedience to his

edicts, and for the offences of reading the Scriptures, of looking

askance at a graven image, or of ridiculing the actual presence of the

body and blood of Christ in a wafer, have been placed as high as one

hundred thousand by distinguished authorities, and have never been put at

a lower mark than fifty thousand. The Venetian envoy Navigero placed the

number of victims in the provinces of Holland and Friesland alone at

thirty thousand, and this in 1546, ten years before the abdication, and

five before the promulgation of the hideous edict of 1550!

The edicts and the inquisition were the gift of Charles to the

Netherlands, in return for their wasted treasure and their constant

obedience. For this, his name deserves to be handed down to eternal

infamy, not only throughout the Netherlands, but in every land where a

single heart beats for political or religious freedom. To eradicate these

institutions after they had been watered and watched by the care of his

successor, was the work of an eighty years' war, in the course of which

millions of lives were sacrificed. Yet the abdicating Emperor had

summoned his faithful estates around him, and stood up before them in his

imperial robes for the last time, to tell them of the affectionate regard

which he had always borne them, and to mingle his tears with theirs.

Could a single phantom have risen from one of the many thousand graves

where human beings had been thrust alive by his decree, perhaps there

might have been an answer to the question propounded by the Emperor amid

all that piteous weeping. Perhaps it might have told the man who asked

his hearers to be forgiven if he had ever unwittingly offended them, that

there was a world where it was deemed an offence to torture, strangle,

burn, and drown one's innocent fellow-creatures. The usual but trifling

excuse for such enormities can not be pleaded for the Emperor. Charles

was no fanatic. The man whose armies sacked Rome, who laid his

sacrilegious hands on Christ's vicegerent, and kept the infallible head

of the Church a prisoner to serve his own political ends, was then no

bigot. He believed in nothing; save that when the course of his imperial

will was impeded, and the interests of his imperial house in jeopardy,

pontiffs were to succumb as well as anabaptists. It was the political

heresy which lurked in the restiveness of the religious reformers under

dogma, tradition, and supernatural sanction to temporal power, which he

was disposed to combat to the death. He was too shrewd a politician not

to recognize the connection between aspirations for religious and for

political 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 her

infallibility, he would not have submitted to the peace of Passau, so

long as he could bring a soldier to the field. Yet he acquiesced in the

Reformation for Germany, while the fires for burning the reformers were

ever blazing in the Netherlands, where it was death even to allude to the

existence of the peace of Passau. Nor did he acquiesce only from

compulsion, for long before his memorable defeat by Maurice, he had

permitted the German troops, with whose services he could not dispense,

regularly to attend Protestant worship performed by their own Protestant

chaplains. Lutheran preachers marched from city to city of the

Netherlands under the imperial banner, while the subjects of those

patrimonial provinces were daily suffering on the scaffold for their

nonconformity. The influence of this garrison-preaching upon the progress

of the Reformation in the Netherlands is well known. Charles hated

Lutherans, but he required soldiers, and he thus helped by his own policy

to disseminate what had he been the fanatic which he perhaps became in

retirement, he would have sacrificed his life to crush. It is quite true

that the growing Calvinism of the provinces was more dangerous both

religiously and politically, than the Protestantism of the German

princes, which had not yet been formally pronounced heresy, but it is

thus the more evident that it was political rather than religious

heterodoxy which the despot wished to suppress.

No man, however, could have been more observant of religious rites. He

heard mass daily. He listened to a sermon every Sunday and holiday. He

confessed and received the sacrament four times a year. He was sometimes

to be seen in his tent at midnight, on his knees before a crucifix with

eyes and hands uplifted. He ate no meat in Lent, and used extraordinary

diligence to discover and to punish any man, whether courtier or

plebeian, who failed to fast during the whole forty days. He was too good

a politician not to know the value of broad phylacteries and long

prayers. He was too nice an observer of human nature not to know how

easily mint and cummin could still outweigh the "weightier matters of

law, judgment, mercy and faith;" as if the founder of the religion which

he professed, and to maintain which he had established the inquisition

and the edicts, had never cried woe upon the Pharisees. Yet there is no

doubt that the Emperor was at times almost popular in the Netherlands,

and that he was never as odious as his successor. There were some deep

reasons for this, and some superficial ones; among others, a singularly

fortunate manner. He spoke German, Spanish, Italian, French, and Flemish,

and could assume the characteristics of each country as easily as he

could use its language. He could be stately with Spaniards, familiar with

Flemings witty with Italians. He could strike down a bull in the ring

like a matador at Madrid, or win the prize in the tourney like a knight

of old; he could ride at the ring with the Flemish nobles, hit the

popinjay with his crossbow among Antwerp artisans, or drink beer and

exchange rude jests with the boors of Brabant. For virtues such as these,

his grave crimes against God and man, against religion and chartered and

solemnly-sworn rights have been palliated, as if oppression became more

tolerable because the oppressor was an accomplished linguist and a good

marksman.

But the great reason for his popularity no doubt lay in his military

genius. Charles was inferior to no general of his age. "When he was born

into the world," said Alva, "he was born a soldier," and the Emperor

confirmed the statement and reciprocated the compliment, when he declared

that "the three first captains of the age were himself first, and then

the Duke of Alva and Constable Montmorency." It is quite true that all

his officers were not of the same opinion, and many were too apt to

complain 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. He

was constitutionally fearless, and he possessed great energy and

endurance. 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 in

chief, even when surrounded by veterans and crippled by the gout. He was

calm in great reverses. It was said that he was never known to change

color except upon two occasions: after the fatal destruction of his fleet

at Algiers, and in the memorable flight from Innspruck. He was of a

phlegmatic, stoical temperament, until shattered by age and disease; a

man without a sentiment and without a tear. It was said by Spaniards that

he was never seen to weep, even at the death of his nearest relatives and

friends, except on the solitary occasion of the departure of Don Ferrante

Gonzaga from court. Such a temperament was invaluable in the stormy

career to which he had devoted his life. He was essentially a man of

action, a military chieftain. "Pray only for my health and my life," he

was accustomed to say to the young officers who came to him from every

part of his dominions to serve under his banners, "for so, long as I have

these I will never leave you idle; at least in France. I love peace no

better than the rest of you. I was born and bred to arms, and must of

necessity keep on my harness till I can bear it no longer." The restless

energy and the magnificent tranquillity of his character made him a hero

among princes, an idol with his officers, a popular favorite every where.

The promptness with which, at much personal hazard, he descended like a

thunderbolt in the midst of the Ghent insurrection; the juvenile ardor

with which the almost bedridden man arose from his sick-bed to smite the

Protestants at Muhlberg; the grim stoicism with which he saw sixty

thousand of his own soldiers perish in the wintry siege of Metz; all

ensured him a large measure of that applause which ever follows military

distinction, especially when the man who achieves it happens to wear a

crown. He combined the personal prowess of a knight of old with the more

modern accomplishments of a scientific tactician. He could charge the

enemy in person like the most brilliant cavalry officer, and he

thoroughly understood the arrangements of a campaign, the marshalling and

victualling of troops, and the whole art of setting and maintaining an

army 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 to

friend and foe, knightly loyalty to a cause deemed sacred, the sacrifice

of personal interests to great ideas, generosity of hand and heart; all

those qualities which unite with courage and constancy to make up the

ideal chevalier, Charles not only lacked but despised. He trampled on the

weak antagonist, whether burgher or petty potentate. He was false as

water. He inveigled his foes who trusted to imperial promises, by arts

unworthy an emperor or a gentleman. He led about the unfortunate John

Frederic of Saxony, in his own language, "like a bear in a chain," ready

to be slipped upon Maurice should "the boy" prove ungrateful. He connived

at the famous forgery of the prelate of Arras, to which the Landgrave

Philip owed his long imprisonment; a villany worse than many for which

humbler rogues have suffered by thousands upon the gallows. The

contemporary world knew well the history of his frauds, on scale both

colossal and minute, and called him familiarly "Charles qui triche."

The absolute master of realms on which the sun perpetually shone, he was

not only greedy for additional dominion, but he was avaricious in small

matters, and hated to part with a hundred dollars. To the soldier who

brought him the sword and gauntlets of Francis the First, he gave a

hundred crowns, when ten thousand would have been less than the customary

present; so that the man left his presence full of desperation. The three

soldiers who swam the Elbe, with their swords in their mouths; to bring

him the boats with which he passed to the victory of Muhlberg, received

from his imperial bounty a doublet, a pair of stockings, and four crowns

apiece. His courtiers and ministers complained bitterly of his habitual

niggardliness, and were fain to eke out their slender salaries by

accepting bribes from every hand rich enough to bestow them. In truth

Charles was more than any thing else a politician, notwithstanding his

signal abilities as a soldier. If to have founded institutions which

could last, be the test of statesmanship, he was even a statesman; for

many of his institutions have resisted the pressure of three centuries.

But those of Charlemagne fell as soon as his hand was cold, while the

works of many ordinary legislators have attained to a perpetuity denied

to the statutes of Solon or Lycurgus. Durability is not the test of merit

in human institutions. Tried by the only touchstone applicable to

governments, their capacity to insure the highest welfare of the

governed, we shall not find his polity deserving of much admiration. It

is not merely that he was a despot by birth and inclination, nor that he

naturally substituted as far as was practicable, the despotic for the

republican element, wherever his hand can be traced. There may be

possible good in despotisms as there is often much tyranny in democracy.

Tried however according to the standard by which all governments may be

measured, those laws of truth and divine justice which all Christian

nations recognize, and which are perpetual, whether recognized or not, we

shall find little to venerate in the life work of the Emperor. The

interests of his family, the security of his dynasty, these were his end

and aim. The happiness or the progress of his people never furnished even

the indirect motives of his conduct, and the result was a baffled policy

and a crippled and bankrupt empire at last.

He knew men, especially he knew their weaknesses, and he knew how to turn

them to account. He knew how much they would bear, and that little

grievances would sometimes inflame more than vast and deliberate

injustice. Therefore he employed natives mainly in the subordinate

offices of his various states, and he repeatedly warned his successor

that the haughtiness of Spaniards and the incompatibility of their

character with the Flemish, would be productive of great difficulties and

dangers. It was his opinion that men might be tyrannized more

intelligently by their own kindred, and in this perhaps he was right. He

was indefatigable in the discharge of business, and if it were possible

that half a world could be administered as if it were the private

property of an individual, the task would have been perhaps as well

accomplished by Charles as by any man. He had not the absurdity of

supposing it possible for him to attend to the details of every

individual affair in every one of his realms; and he therefore intrusted

the stewardship of all specialities to his various ministers and agents.

It was his business to know men and to deal with affairs on a large

scale, and in this he certainly was superior to his successor. His

correspondence was mainly in the hands of Granvelle the elder, who

analyzed letters received, and frequently wrote all but the signatures of

the answers. The same minister usually possessed the imperial ear, and

farmed it out for his own benefit. In all this there was of course room

for 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 his

system. Granvelle grew enormously rich under his eye by trading on the

imperial favor and sparing his majesty much trouble. Charles saw it all,

ridiculed his peculations, but called him his "bed of down." His

knowledge of human nature was however derived from a contemplation mainly

of its weaknesses, and was therefore one-sided. He was often deceived,

and made many a fatal blunder, shrewd politician though he was. He

involved himself often in enterprises which could not be honorable or

profitable, and which inflicted damage on his greatest interests. He

often offended men who might have been useful friends, and converted

allies into enemies. "His Majesty," said a keen observer who knew him

well, "has not in his career shown the prudence which was necessary to

him. He has often offended those whose love he might have conciliated,

converted friends into enemies, and let those perish who were his most

faithful partisans." Thus it must be acknowledged that even his boasted

knowledge of human nature and his power of dealing with men was rather

superficial and empirical than the real gift of genius.

His personal habits during the greater part of his life were those of an

indefatigable soldier. He could remain in the saddle day and night, and

endure every hardship but hunger. He was addicted to vulgar and

miscellaneous incontinence. He was an enormous eater. He breakfasted at

five, on a fowl seethed in milk and dressed with sugar and spices. After

this he went to sleep again. He dined at twelve, partaking always of

twenty dishes. He supped twice; at first, soon after vespers, and the

second time at midnight or one o'clock, which meal was, perhaps, the most

solid of the four. After meat he ate a great quantity of pastry and

sweetmeats, and he irrigated every repast by vast draughts of beer and

wine. His stomach, originally a wonderful one, succumbed after forty

years of such labors. His taste, but not his appetite began to fail, and

he complained to his majordomo, that all his food was insipid. The reply

is, perhaps, among the most celebrated of facetia. The cook could do

nothing more unless he served his Majesty a pasty of watches. The

allusion to the Emperor's passion for horology was received with great

applause. 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 that

the fooling was less admirable at the imperial court than some of the

recorded quips of Tribaulet would lead us to suppose.

The transfer of the other crowns and dignitaries to Philip, was

accomplished a month afterwards, in a quiet manner. Spain, Sicily, the

Balearic Islands, America, and other portions of the globe, were made

over without more display than an ordinary 'donatio inter vivos'. The

Empire occasioned some difficulty. It had been already signified to

Ferdinand, that his brother was to resign the imperial crown in his

favor, and the symbols of sovereignty were accordingly transmitted to him

by the hands of William of Orange. A deputation, moreover, of which that

nobleman, Vice-Chancellor Seld, and Dr. Wolfgang Haller were the chiefs,

was despatched to signify to the electors of the Empire the step which

had been thus resolved upon. A delay of more than two years, however,

intervened, occasioned partly by the deaths of three electors, partly by

the war which so soon broke out in Europe, before the matter was formally

acted upon. In February, 1553, however, the electors, having been

assembled in Frankfort, received the abdication of Charles, and proceeded

to the election of Ferdinand. That Emperor was crowned in March, and

immediately 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, hated

Charles and all his race. He accordingly denied the validity of the whole

transaction, without sanction previously obtained from the Pope, to whom

all crowns belonged. Ferdinand, after listening, through his envoys, to

much ridiculous dogmatism on the part of the Pope, at last withdrew from

the discussion, with a formal protest, and was first recognized by

Caraffa'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, until

August of the year 1556. On the 27th of that month, he addressed a letter

from Ghent to John of Osnabruck, president of the Chamber of Spiers,

stating his abdication in favor of Ferdinand, and requesting that in the

interim the same obedience might be rendered to Ferdinand, as could have

been yielded to himself. Ten days later; he addressed a letter to the

estates of the Empire, stating the same fact; and on the 17th September,

1556, he set sail from Zeland for Spain. These delays and difficulties

occasioned some misconceptions. Many persons who did not admire an

abdication, which others, on the contrary, esteemed as an act of

unexampled magnanimity, stoutly denied that it was the intention of

Charles to renounce the Empire. The Venetian envoy informed his

government that Ferdinand was only to be lieutenant for Charles, under

strict limitations, and that the Emperor was to resume the government so

soon as his health would allow. The Bishop of Arras and Don Juan de

Manrique had both assured him, he said, that Charles would not, on any

account, definitely abdicate. Manrique even asserted that it was a mere

farce to believe in any such intention. The Emperor ought to remain to

protect his son, by the resources of the Empire, against France, the

Turks, and the heretics. His very shadow was terrible to the Lutherans,

and his form might be expected to rise again in stern reality from its

temporary grave. Time has shown the falsity of all these imaginings, but

views 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 was

then so extraordinary, and how little consonant it was in their eyes with

true propriety. It was necessary to ascend to the times of Diocletian, to

find an example of a similar abdication of empire, on so deliberate and

extensive a scale, and the great English historian of the Roman Empire

has compared the two acts with each other. But there seems a vast

difference between the cases. Both emperors were distinguished soldiers;

both were merciless persecutors of defenceless Christians; both exchanged

unbounded empire for absolute seclusion. But Diocletian was born in the

lowest abyss of human degradation--the slave and the son of a slave. For

such a man, after having reached the highest pinnacle of human greatness,

voluntarily to descend from power, seems an act of far greater

magnanimity than the retreat of Charles. Born in the purple, having

exercised unlimited authority from his boyhood, and having worn from his

cradle so many crowns and coronets, the German Emperor might well be

supposed to have learned to estimate them at their proper value.

Contemporary minds were busy, however, to discover the hidden motives

which could have influenced him, and the world, even yet, has hardly

ceased to wonder. Yet it would have been more wonderful, considering the

Emperor's character, had he remained. The end had not crowned the work;

it not unreasonably discrowned the workman. The earlier, and indeed the

greater part of his career had been one unbroken procession of triumphs.

The cherished dream of his grandfather, and of his own youth, to add the

Pope's triple crown to the rest of the hereditary possessions of his

family, he had indeed been obliged to resign. He had too much practical

Flemish sense to indulge long in chimeras, but he had achieved the Empire

over formidable rivals, and he had successively not only conquered, but

captured almost every potentate who had arrayed himself in arms against

him. Clement and Francis, the Dukes and Landgraves of, Clever, Hesse,

Saxony, and Brunswick, he had bound to his chariot wheels; forcing many

to eat the bread of humiliation and captivity, during long and weary

years. But the concluding portion of his reign had reversed all its

previous glories. His whole career had been a failure. He had been

defeated, after all, in most of his projects. He had humbled Francis, but

Henry had most signally avenged his father. He had trampled upon Philip

of Hesse and Frederic of Saxony, but it had been reserved for one of that

German race, which he characterized as "dreamy, drunken, and incapable of

intrigue," to outwit the man who had outwitted all the world, and to

drive before him, in ignominious flight, the conqueror of the nations.

The German lad who had learned both war and dissimulation in the court

and camp of him who was so profound a master of both arts, was destined

to 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 was

gathering around him. While he was preparing to crush, forever, the

Protestant Church, with the arms which a bench of bishops were forging,

lo! the rapid and desperate Maurice, with long red beard streaming like a

meteor in the wind, dashing through the mountain passes, at the head of

his lancers--arguments more convincing than all the dogmas of Granvelle!

Disguised as an old woman, the Emperor had attempted on the 6th April, to

escape in a peasant's wagon, from Innspruck into Flanders. Saved for the

time by the mediation of Ferdinand, he had, a few weeks later, after his

troops had been defeated by Maurice, at Fussen, again fled at midnight of

the 22nd May, almost unattended, sick in body and soul, in the midst of

thunder, lightning, and rain, along the difficult Alpine passes from

Innspruck into Carinthia. His pupil had permitted his escape, only

because in his own language, "for such a bird he had no convenient cage."

The imprisoned princes now owed their liberation, not to the Emperor's

clemency, but to his panic. The peace of Passau, in the following August,

crushed the whole fabric of the Emperor's toil, and laid-the foundation

of the Protestant Church. He had smitten the Protestants at Muhlberg for

the last time. On the other hand, the man who had dealt with Rome, as if

the Pope, not he, had been the vassal, was compelled to witness, before

he departed, the insolence of a pontiff who took a special pride in

insulting and humbling his house, and trampling upon the pride of

Charles, Philip and Ferdinand. In France too, the disastrous siege of

Metz had taught him that in the imperial zodiac the fatal sign of Cancer

had been reached. The figure of a crab, with the words "plus citra,"

instead of his proud motto of "plus ultra," scrawled on the walls where

he had resided during that dismal epoch, avenged more deeply, perhaps,

than the jester thought, the previous misfortunes of France. The Grand

Turk, too, Solyman the Magnificent, possessed most of Hungary, and held

at that moment a fleet ready to sail against Naples, in co-operation with

the Pope and France. Thus the Infidel, the Protestant, and the Holy

Church were all combined together to crush him. Towards all the great

powers of the earth, he stood not in the attitude of a conqueror, but of

a disappointed, baffled, defeated potentate. Moreover, he had been foiled

long before in his earnest attempts to secure the imperial throne for

Philip. Ferdinand and Maximilian had both stoutly resisted his arguments

and his blandishments. The father had represented the slender patrimony

of their branch of the family, compared with the enormous heritage of

Philip; 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 to

provide for him. Maximilian, also, assured his uncle that he had as good

an appetite for the crown as Philip, and could digest the dignity quite

as easily. The son, too, for whom the Emperor was thus solicitous, had

already, before the abdication, repaid his affection with ingratitude. He

had turned out all his father's old officials in Milan, and had refused

to visit him at Brussels, till assured as to the amount of ceremonial

respect which the new-made king was to receive at the hands of his

father.

Had the Emperor continued to live and reign, he would have found himself

likewise engaged in mortal combat with that great religious movement in

the Netherlands, which he would not have been able many years longer to

suppress, and which he left as a legacy of blood and fire to his

successor. Born in the same year with his century, Charles was a

decrepit, exhausted man at fifty-five, while that glorious age, in which

humanity was to burst forever the cerements in which it had so long been

buried, was but awakening to a consciousness of its strength.

Disappointed in his schemes, broken in his fortunes, with income

anticipated, estates mortgaged, all his affairs in confusion; failing in

mental powers, and with a constitution hopelessly shattered; it was time

for him to retire. He showed his keenness in recognizing the fact that

neither his power nor his glory would be increased, should he lag

superfluous on the stage where mortification instead of applause was

likely to be his portion. His frame was indeed but a wreck. Forty years

of unexampled gluttony had done their work. He was a victim to gout,

asthma, dyspepsia, gravel. He was crippled in the neck, arms, knees, and

hands. He was troubled with chronic cutaneous eruptions. His appetite

remained, while his stomach, unable longer to perform the task still

imposed upon it, occasioned him constant suffering. Physiologists, who

know how important a part this organ plays in the affairs of life, will

perhaps see in this physical condition of the Emperor A sufficient

explanation, if explanation were required, of his descent from the

throne. Moreover, it is well known that the resolution to abdicate before

his death had been long a settled scheme with him. It had been formally

agreed between himself and the Empress that they should separate at the

approach of old age, and pass the remainder of their lives in a convent

and a monastery. He had, when comparatively a young man, been struck by

the reply made to him by an aged officer, whose reasons he had asked for,

earnestly soliciting permission to retire from the imperial service. It

was, said the veteran, that he might put a little space of religious

contemplation between the active portion of his life and the grave.

A similar determination, deferred from time to time, Charles had now

carried into execution. While he still lingered in Brussels, after his

abdication, a comet appeared, to warn him to the fulfilment of his

purpose. From first to last, comets and other heavenly bodies were much

connected with his evolutions and arrangements. There was no mistaking

the motives with which this luminary had presented itself. The Emperor

knew very well, says a contemporary German chronicler, that it portended

pestilence and war, together with the approaching death of mighty

princes. "My fates call out," he cried, and forthwith applied himself to

hasten the preparations for his departure.

The romantic picture of his philosophical retirement at Juste, painted

originally by Sandoval and Siguenza, reproduced by the fascinating pencil

of Strada, and imitated in frequent succession by authors of every age

and country, is unfortunately but a sketch of fancy. The investigations

of modern writers have entirely thrown down the scaffolding on which the

airy fabric, so delightful to poets and moralists, reposed. The departing

Emperor stands no longer in a transparency robed in shining garments. His

transfiguration is at an end. Every action, almost every moment of his

retirement, accurately chronicled by those who shared his solitude, have

been placed before our eyes, in the most felicitous manner, by able and

brilliant writers. The Emperor, shorn of the philosophical robe in which

he had been conventionally arrayed for three centuries, shivers now in

the cold air of reality.

So far from his having immersed himself in profound and pious

contemplation, below the current of the world's events, his thoughts, on

the contrary, never were for a moment diverted from the political surface

of the times. He read nothing but despatches; he wrote or dictated

interminable ones in reply, as dull and prolix as any which ever came

from his pen. He manifested a succession of emotions at the course of

contemporary affairs, as intense and as varied, as if the world still

rested in his palm. He was, in truth, essentially a man of action. He had

neither the taste nor talents which make a man great in retirement. Not a

lofty thought, not a generous sentiment, not a profound or acute

suggestion in his retreat has been recorded from his lips. The epigrams

which had been invented for him by fabulists have been all taken away,

and nothing has been substituted, save a few dull jests exchanged with

stupid friars. So far from having entertained and even expressed that

sentiment of religious toleration for which he was said to have been

condemned as a heretic by the inquisition, and for which Philip was

ridiculously reported to have ordered his father's body to be burned, and

his ashes scattered to the winds, he became in retreat the bigot

effectually, which during his reign he had only been conventionally.

Bitter regrets that he should have kept his word to Luther, as if he had

not broken faith enough to reflect upon in his retirement; stern

self-reproach for omitting to put to death, while he had him in his

power, the man who had caused all the mischief of the age; fierce

instructions thundered from his retreat to the inquisitors to hasten the

execution of all heretics, including particularly his ancient friends,

preachers and almoners, Cazalla and Constantine de Fuente; furious

exhortations to Philip--as if Philip needed a prompter in such a

work--that he should set himself to "cutting out the root of heresy with

rigor and rude chastisement;"--such explosions of savage bigotry as

these, alternating with exhibitions of revolting gluttony, with surfeits

of sardine omelettes, Estramadura sausages, eel pies, pickled partridges,

fat capons, quince syrups, iced beer, and flagons of Rhenish, relieved by

copious draughts of senna and rhubarb, to which his horror-stricken

doctor doomed him as he ate--compose a spectacle less attractive to the

imagination 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

PHILIP THE SECOND IN THE NETHERLANDS

1555-1558 [CHAPTER II.]

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 of

Naples, previously to his marriage with Mary Tudor. The imperial crown he

had been obliged, much against his will, to forego. The archduchy of

Austria, with the hereditary German dependencies of his father's family,

had been transferred by the Emperor to his brother Ferdinand, on the

occasion of the marriage of that prince with Anna, only sister of King

Louis of Hungary. Ten years afterwards, Ferdinand (King of Hungary and

Bohemia since the death of Louis, slain in 1526 at the battle of Mohacz)

was elected King of the Romans, and steadily refused all the entreaties

afterwards made to him in behalf of Philip, to resign his crown and his

succession to the Empire, in favor of his nephew. With these diminutions,

Philip had now received all the dominions of his father. He was King of

all the Spanish kingdoms and of both the Sicilies. He was titular King of

England, France, and Jerusalem. He was "Absolute Dominator" in Asia,

Africa, and America; he was Duke of Milan and of both Burgundies, and

Hereditary Sovereign of the seventeen Netherlands.

Thus the provinces had received a new master. A man of foreign birth and

breeding, not speaking a word of their language, nor of any language

which the mass of the inhabitants understood, was now placed in supreme

authority over them, because he represented, through the females, the

"good" Philip of Burgundy, who a century before had possessed himself by

inheritance, purchase, force, or fraud, of the sovereignty in most of

those provinces. It is necessary to say an introductory word or two

concerning the previous history of the man to whose hands the destiny of

so many millions was now entrusted.

He was born in May, 1527, and was now therefore twenty-eight years of

age. At the age of sixteen he had been united to his cousin, Maria of

Portugal, daughter of John III. and of the Emperor's sister, Donna

Catalina. In the following year (1544) he became father of the celebrated

and 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 of

her attendants. The Duchess of Alva, and other ladies who had charge of

her during her confinement, deserted her chamber in order to obtain

absolution by witnessing an auto-da-fe of heretics. During their absence,

the princess partook voraciously of a melon, and forfeited her life in

consequence.

In 1548, Don Philip had made his first appearance in the Netherlands. He

came thither to receive homage in the various provinces as their future

sovereign, and to exchange oaths of mutual fidelity with them all. Andrew

Doria, with a fleet of fifty ships, had brought him to Genoa, whence he

had passed to Milan, where he was received with great rejoicing. At Trent

he was met by Duke Maurice of Saxony, who warmly begged his intercession

with the Emperor in behalf of the imprisoned Landgrave of Hesse. This

boon Philip was graciously pleased to promise,--and to keep the pledge as

sacredly 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 and

escorted him to Brussels. A summer was spent in great festivities, the

cities of the Nether lands vieing with each other in magnificent

celebrations of the ceremonies, by which Philip successively swore

allegiance to the various constitutions and charters of the provinces,

and received their oaths of future fealty in return. His oath to support

all the constitutions and privileges was without reservation, while his

father and grandfather had only sworn to maintain the charters granted or

confirmed by Philip and Charles of Burgundy. Suspicion was disarmed by

these indiscriminate concessions, which had been resolved upon by the

unscrupulous Charles to conciliate the good will of the people. In view

of the pretensions which might be preferred by the Brederode family in

Holland, and by other descendants of ancient sovereign races in other

provinces, the Emperor, wishing to ensure the succession to his sisters

in 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 the

weak. Although the house of Burgundy had usurped many of the provinces on

the express pretext that females could not inherit, the rule had been

already violated, and he determined to spare no pains to conciliate the

estates, in order that they might be content with a new violation, should

the contingency occur. Philip's oaths were therefore without reserve, and

the light-hearted Flemings, Brabantines, and Walloons received him with

open arms. In Valenciennes the festivities which attended his entrance

were on a most gorgeous scale, but the "joyous entrance" arranged for him

at Antwerp was of unparalleled magnificence. A cavalcade of the

magistrates and notable burghers, "all attired in cramoisy velvet,"

attended by lackies in splendid liveries and followed by four thousand

citizen soldiers in full uniform, went forth from the gates to receive

him. Twenty-eight triumphal arches, which alone, according to the thrifty

chronicler, had cost 26,800 Carolus guldens, were erected in the

different streets and squares, and every possible demonstration of

affectionate welcome was lavished upon the Prince and the Emperor. The

rich and prosperous city, unconscious of the doom which awaited it in the

future, seemed to have covered itself with garlands to honor the approach

of its master. Yet icy was the deportment with which Philip received

these demonstrations of affection, and haughty the glance with which he

looked down upon these exhibitions of civic hilarity, as from the height

of a grim and inaccessible tower. The impression made upon the

Netherlanders was any thing but favorable, and when he had fully

experienced the futility of the projects on the Empire which it was so

difficult both for his father and himself to resign, he returned to the

more congenial soil of Spain. In 1554 he had again issued from the

peninsula to marry the Queen of England, a privilege which his father had

graciously resigned to him. He was united to Mary Tudor at Winchester, on

the 25th July of that year, and if congeniality of tastes could have made

a marriage happy, that union should have been thrice blessed. To maintain

the supremacy of the Church seemed to both the main object of existence,

to execute unbelievers the most sacred duty imposed by the Deity upon

anointed princes, to convert their kingdoms into a hell the surest means

of winning Heaven for themselves. It was not strange that the conjunction

of two such wonders of superstition in one sphere should have seemed

portentous in the eyes of the English nation. Philip's mock efforts in

favor of certain condemned reformers, and his pretended intercessions in

favor of the Princess Elizabeth, failed entirely of their object. The

parliament refused to confer upon him more than a nominal authority in

England. His children, should they be born, might be sovereigns; he was

but husband of the Queen; of a woman who could not atone by her abject

but peevish fondness for himself, and by her congenial blood-thirstiness

towards her subjects, for her eleven years seniority, her deficiency in

attractions, and her incapacity to make him the father of a line of

English monarchs. It almost excites compassion even for Mary Tudor, when

her passionate efforts to inspire him with affection are contrasted with

his impassiveness. Tyrant, bigot, murderess though she was, she was still

woman, and she lavished upon her husband all that was not ferocious in

her nature. Forbidding prayers to be said for the soul of her father,

hating her sister and her people, burning bishops, bathing herself in the

blood of heretics, to Philip she was all submissiveness and feminine

devotion. It was a most singular contrast, Mary, the Queen of England and

Mary 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 of

care 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 her

tastes, skilful with her needle, fond of embroidery work, striking the

lute with a touch remarkable for its science and feeling, speaking many

languages, including Latin, with fluency and grace; most feminine, too,

in her constitutional sufferings, hysterical of habit, shedding floods of

tears daily at Philip's coldness, undisguised infidelity, and frequent

absences from England--she almost awakens compassion and causes a

momentary oblivion of her identity.

Her subjects, already half maddened by religious persecution, were

exasperated still further by the pecuniary burthens which she imposed

upon them to supply the King's exigencies, and she unhesitatingly

confronted their frenzy, in the hope of winning a smile from him. When at

last her chronic maladies had assumed the memorable form which caused

Philip and Mary to unite in a letter to Cardinal Pole, announcing not the

expected but the actual birth of a prince, but judiciously leaving the

date in blank, the momentary satisfaction and delusion of the Queen was

unbounded. The false intelligence was transmitted every where. Great were

the joy and the festivities in the Netherlands, where people were so

easily made to rejoice and keep holiday for any thing. "The Regent, being

in Antwerp," wrote Sir Thomas Gresham to the lords of council, "did cause

the great bell to rings to give all men to understand that the news was

trewe. The Queene's highness here merchants caused all our Inglishe ships

to shoote off with such joy and triumph, as by men's arts and pollicey

coulde be devised--and the Regent sent our Inglishe maroners one hundred

crownes to drynke." If bell-ringing and cannon-firing could have given

England a Spanish sovereign, the devoutly-wished consummation would have

been reached. When the futility of the royal hopes could no longer be

concealed, Philip left the country, never to return till his war with

France made him require troops, subsidies, and a declaration of

hostilities 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 the

absolute reverse of his father. Upon his first journey out of Spain, in

1548, into his various dominions, he had made a most painful impression

every 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 the

impropriety of his manners, had produced, however, some effect, so that

on his wedding journey to England, he manifested much "gentleness and

humanity, mingled with royal gravity." Upon this occasion, says another

Venetian, accredited to him, "he had divested himself of that Spanish

haughtiness, which, when he first came from Spain, had rendered him so

odious." The famous ambassador, Badovaro confirms the impression. "Upon

his first journey," he says, "he was esteemed proud, and too greedy for

the imperial succession; but now 'tis the common opinion that his

humanity and modesty are all which could be desired." These humane

qualities, however, it must be observed, were exhibited only in the

presence 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 infirm

valetudinarian, and was considered as sluggish in character, as deficient

in martial enterprise, as timid of temperament as he was fragile and

sickly of frame. It is true, that on account of the disappointment which

he occasioned by his contrast to his warlike father, he mingled in some

tournaments in Brussels, where he was matched against Count Mansfeld, one

of the most distinguished chieftains of the age, and where, says his

professed panegyrist, "he broke his lances very mach to the satisfaction

of his father and aunts."

That learned and eloquent author, Estelle Calvete, even filled the

greater part of a volume, in which he described the journey of the

Prince, with a minute description of these feasts and jousts, but we may

reasonably conclude that to the loyal imagination of his eulogist Philip

is indebted for most of these knightly trophies. It was the universal

opinion of unprejudiced cotemporaries, that he was without a spark of

enterprise. He was even censured for a culpable want of ambition, and for

being inferior to his father in this respect, as if the love of

encroaching on his neighbor's dominions, and a disposition to foreign.

commotions and war would have constituted additional virtues, had he

happened to possess them. Those who were most disposed to think favorably

of him, remembered that there was a time when even Charles the Fifth was

thought weak and indolent, and were willing to ascribe Philip's pacific

disposition to his habitual cholic and side-ache, and to his father's

inordinate care for him in youth. They even looked forward to the time

when 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 correct

opinion, as it proved, being, that Philip hated war, would never

certainly acquire any personal distinction in the field, and when engaged

in hostilities would be apt to gather his laurels at the hands of his

generals, rather than with his own sword. He was believed to be the

reverse of the Emperor. Charles sought great enterprises, Philip would

avoid them. The Emperor never recoiled before threats; the son was

reserved, cautious, suspicious of all men, and capable of sacrificing a

realm from hesitation and timidity. The father had a genius for action,

the son a predilection for repose. Charles took "all men's opinions, but

reserved his judgment," and acted on it, when matured, with irresistible

energy; 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 shine

as a warrior. His mental capacity, in general, was likewise not very

highly esteemed. His talents were, in truth, very much below mediocrity.

His mind was incredibly small. A petty passion for contemptible details

characterized him from his youth, and, as long as he lived, he could

neither learn to generalize, nor understand that one man, however

diligent, could not be minutely acquainted with all the public and

private 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 which

he 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, and

he lived in his cabinet. He gave audiences to ambassadors and deputies

very willingly, listening attentively to all that was said to him, and

answering in monosyllables. He spoke no tongue but Spanish; and was

sufficiently sparing of that, but he was indefatigable with his pen. He

hated to converse, but he could write a letter eighteen pages long, when

his correspondent was in the next room, and when the subject was,

perhaps, one which a man of talent could have settled with six words of

his tongue. The world, in his opinion, was to move upon protocols and

apostilles. Events had no right to be born throughout his dominions,

without a preparatory course of his obstetrical pedantry. He could never

learn that the earth would not rest on its axis, while he wrote a

programme of the way it was to turn. He was slow in deciding, slower in

communicating his decisions. He was prolix with his pen, not from

affluence, but from paucity of ideas. He took refuge in a cloud of words,

sometimes to conceal his meaning, oftener to conceal the absence of any

meaning, thus mystifying not only others but himself. To one great

purpose, formed early, he adhered inflexibly. This, however, was rather

an instinct than an opinion; born with him, not created by him. The idea

seemed to express itself through him, and to master him, rather than to

form one of a stock of sentiments which a free agent might be expected to

possess. Although at certain times, even this master-feeling could yield

to the pressure of a predominant self-interest-thus showing that even in

Philip bigotry was not absolute--yet he appeared on the whole the

embodiment of Spanish chivalry and Spanish religious enthusiasm, in its

late and corrupted form. He was entirely a Spaniard. The Burgundian and

Austrian elements of his blood seemed to have evaporated, and his veins

were filled alone with the ancient ardor, which in heroic centuries had

animated the Gothic champions of Spain. The fierce enthusiasm for the

Cross, which in the long internal warfare against the Crescent, had been

the romantic and distinguishing feature of the national character, had

degenerated into bigotry. That which had been a nation's glory now made

the monarch's shame. The Christian heretic was to be regarded with a more

intense hatred than even Moor or Jew had excited in the most Christian

ages, and Philip was to be the latest and most perfect incarnation of all

this traditional enthusiasm, this perpetual hate. Thus he was likely to

be single-hearted in his life. It was believed that his ambition would be

less to extend his dominions than to vindicate his title of the most

Catholic king. There could be little doubt entertained that he would be,

at least, dutiful to his father in this respect, and that the edicts

would be enforced to the letter.

He was by birth, education, and character, a Spaniard, and that so

exclusively, that the circumstance would alone have made him unfit to

govern a country so totally different in habits and national sentiments

from his native land. He was more a foreigner in Brussels, even, than in

England. The gay, babbling, energetic, noisy life of Flanders and Brabant

was detestable to him. The loquacity of the Netherlanders was a continual

reproach upon his taciturnity. His education had imbued him, too, with

the antiquated international hatred of Spaniard and Fleming, which had

been strengthening in the metropolis, while the more rapid current of

life had rather tended to obliterate the sentiment in the provinces.

The flippancy and profligacy of Philip the Handsome, the extortion and

insolence of his Flemish courtiers, had not been forgotten in Spain, nor

had Philip the Second forgiven his grandfather for having been a

foreigner. And now his mad old grandmother, Joanna, who had for years

been chasing cats in the lonely tower where she had been so long

imprisoned, had just died; and her funeral, celebrated with great pomp by

both her sons, by Charles at Brussels and Ferdinand at Augsburg, seemed

to revive a history which had begun to fade, and to recall the image of

Castilian sovereignty which had been so long obscured in the blaze of

imperial grandeur.

His education had been but meagre. In an age when all kings and noblemen

possessed many languages, he spoke not a word of any tongue but

Spanish,--although he had a slender knowledge of French and Italian,

which he afterwards learned to read with comparative facility. He had

studied a little history and geography, and he had a taste for sculpture,

painting, and architecture. Certainly if he had not possessed a feeling

for art, he would have been a monster. To have been born in the earlier

part 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 inspired

with a spark of that fire which glowed so intensely in those favored

lands and in that golden age, had indeed been difficult.

The King's personal habits were regular. His delicate health made it

necessary for him to attend to his diet, although he was apt to exceed in

sweetmeats and pastry. He slept much, and took little exercise

habitually, but he had recently been urged by the physicians to try the

effect of the chase as a corrective to his sedentary habits. He was most

strict in religious observances, as regular at mass, sermons, and vespers

as a monk; much more, it was thought by many good Catholics, than was

becoming to his rank and age. Besides several friars who preached

regularly for his instruction, he had daily discussions with others on

abstruse theological points. He consulted his confessor most minutely as

to all the actions of life, inquiring anxiously whether this proceeding

or that were likely to burthen his conscience. He was grossly licentious.

It was his chief amusement to issue forth at night disguised, that he

might indulge in vulgar and miscellaneous incontinence in the common

haunts of vice. This was his solace at Brussels in the midst of the

gravest affairs of state. He was not illiberal, but, on the contrary, it

was thought that he would have been even generous, had he not been

straitened 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 was

fond of jests in private, and would laugh immoderately, when with a few

intimate associates, at buffooneries, which he checked in public by the

icy gravity of his deportment. He dressed usually in the Spanish fashion,

with close doublet, trunk hose, and short cloak, although at times he

indulged in the more airy fashions of France and Burgundy, wearing

buttons on his coats and feathers in his hat. He was not thought at that

time to be cruel by nature, but was usually spoken of, in the

conventional language appropriated to monarchs, as a prince "clement,

benign, and debonnaire." Time was to show the justice of his claims to

such honorable epithets.

The court was organized during his residence at Brussels on the

Burgundian, not the Spanish model, but of the one hundred and fifty

persons who composed it, nine tenths of the whole were Spaniards; the

other fifteen or sixteen being of various nations, Flemings, Burgundians,

Italians, English, and Germans. Thus it is obvious how soon he

disregarded his father's precept and practice in this respect, and began

to lay the foundation of that renewed hatred to Spaniards which was soon

to become so intense, exuberant, and fatal throughout every class of

Netherlanders. He esteemed no nation but the Spanish, with Spaniards he

consorted, with Spaniards he counselled, through Spaniards he governed.

His council consisted of five or six Spanish grandees, the famous Ruy

Gomez, then Count of Melito, afterwards Prince of Eboli; the Duke of

Alva, the Count de Feria, the Duke of Franca Villa, Don Antonio Toledo,

and Don Juan Manrique de Lara. The "two columns," said Suriano, "which

sustain this great machine, are Ruy Gomez and Alva, and from their

councils depends the government of half the world." The two were ever

bitterly opposed to each other. Incessant were their bickerings, intense

their mutual hate, desperate and difficult the situation of any man,

whether foreigner or native, who had to transact business with the

government. If he had secured the favor of Gomez, he had already earned

the enmity of Alva. Was he protected by the Duke, he was sure to be cast

into outer darkness by the favorite.--Alva represented the war party, Ruy

Gomez the pacific polity more congenial to the heart of Philip. The

Bishop of Arras, who in the opinion of the envoys was worth them all for

his capacity and his experience, was then entirely in the background,

rarely entering the council except when summoned to give advice in

affairs of extraordinary delicacy or gravity. He was, however, to

reappear most signally in course of the events already preparing. The

Duke of Alva, also to play so tremendous a part in the yet unborn history

of the Netherlands, was not beloved by Philip. He was eclipsed at this

period 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 the

duke was naturally hesitating and timid. One would have thought that his

previous victories might have earned for him the reputation for courage

and skill which he most unquestionably deserved. The future was to

develop those other characteristics which were to make his name the

terror and wonder of the world.

The favorite, Ruy Gomez da Silva, Count de Melito, was the man upon whose

shoulders the great burthen of the state reposed. He was of a family

which was originally Portuguese. He had been brought up with the King,

although some eight years his senior, and their friendship dated from

earliest youth. It was said that Ruy Gomez, when a boy, had been

condemned to death for having struck Philip, who had come between him and

another page with whom he was quarrelling. The Prince threw himself

passionately at his father's feet, and implored forgiveness in behalf of

the culprit with such energy that the Emperor was graciously pleased to

spare the life of the future prime minister. The incident was said to

have laid the foundation of the remarkable affection which was supposed

to exist between the two, to an extent never witnessed before between

king and subject. Ruy Gomez was famous for his tact and complacency, and

omitted no opportunity of cementing the friendship thus auspiciously

commenced. He was said to have particularly charmed his master, upon one

occasion, by hypocritically throwing up his cards at a game of hazard

played for a large stake, and permitting him to win the game with a far

inferior hand. The King learning afterwards the true state of the case,

was charmed by the grace and self-denial manifested by the young

nobleman. The complacency which the favorite subsequently exhibited in

regard to the connexion which existed so long and so publicly between his

wife, the celebrated Princess Eboli, and Philip, placed his power upon an

impregnable basis, and secured it till his death.

At the present moment he occupied the three posts of valet, state

councillor, and finance minister. He dressed and undressed his master,

read or talked him to sleep, called him in the morning, admitted those

who were to have private audiences, and superintended all the

arrangements of the household. The rest of the day was devoted to the

enormous correspondence and affairs of administration which devolved upon

him as first minister of state and treasury. He was very ignorant. He had

no experience or acquirement in the arts either of war or peace, and his

early education had been limited. Like his master, he spoke no tongue but

Spanish, and he had no literature. He had prepossessing manners, a fluent

tongue, a winning and benevolent disposition. His natural capacity for

affairs was considerable, and his tact was so perfect that he could

converse face to face with statesmen; doctors, and generals upon

campaigns, theology, or jurisprudence, without betraying any remarkable

deficiency. He was very industrious, endeavoring to make up by hard study

for his lack of general knowledge, and to sustain with credit the burthen

of his daily functions. At the same time, by the King's desire, he

appeared constantly at the frequent banquets, masquerades, tourneys and

festivities, for which Brussels at that epoch was remarkable. It was no

wonder that his cheek was pale, and that he seemed dying of overwork. He

discharged his duties cheerfully, however, for in the service of Philip

he knew no rest. "After God," said Badovaro, "he knows no object save the

felicity of his master." He was already, as a matter of course, very

rich, having been endowed by Philip with property to the amount of

twenty-six thousand dollars yearly, [at values of 1855] and the tide of

his fortunes was still at the flood.

Such were the two men, the master and the favorite, to whose hands the

destinies of the Netherlands were now entrusted.

The Queen of Hungary had resigned the office of Regent of the

Netherlands, as has been seen, on the occasion of the Emperor's

abdication. She was a woman of masculine character, a great huntress

before the Lord, a celebrated horsewoman, a worthy descendant of the Lady

Mary of Burgundy. Notwithstanding all the fine phrases exchanged between

herself and the eloquent Maas, at the great ceremony of the 25th of

October, she was, in reality, much detested in the provinces, and she

repaid their aversion with abhorrence. "I could not live among these

people," 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 my

duty towards God and my prince. As to governing them, I take God to

witness that the task is so abhorrent to me, that I would rather earn my

daily bread by labor than attempt it." She added, that a woman of fifty

years of age, who had served during twenty-five of them, had a right to

repose, 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 with

which she had carried out his designs, knew that it was hopeless to

oppose her retreat. As for Philip, he hated his aunt, and she hated

him--although, both at the epoch of the abdication and subsequently, he

was desirous that she should administer the government.

The new Regent was to be the Duke of Savoy. This wandering and

adventurous potentate had attached himself to Philip's fortunes, and had

been received by the King with as much favor as he had ever enjoyed at

the hands of the Emperor. Emanuel Philibert of Savoy, then about

twenty-six or seven years of age, was the son of the late unfortunate

duke, by Donna Beatrice of Portugal, sister of the Empress. He was the

nephew of Charles, and first cousin to Philip. The partiality of the

Emperor for his mother was well known, but the fidelity with which the

family had followed the imperial cause had been productive of nothing but

disaster to the duke. He had been ruined in fortune, stripped of all his

dignities and possessions. His son's only inheritance was his sword. The

young Prince of Piedmont, as he was commonly called in his youth; sought

the camp of the Emperor, and was received with distinguished favor. He

rose rapidly in the military service. Acting always upon his favorite

motto, "Spoliatis arma supersunt," he had determined, if possible, to

carve his way to glory, to wealth, and even to his hereditary estates, by

his sword alone. War was not only his passion, but his trade. Every one

of his campaigns was a speculation, and he had long derived a

satisfactory income by purchasing distinguished prisoners of war at a low

price from the soldiers who had captured them, and were ignorant of their

rank, and by ransoming them afterwards at an immense advance. This sort

of traffic in men was frequent in that age, and was considered perfectly

honorable. Marshal Strozzi, Count Mansfeld, and other professional

soldiers, derived their main income from the system. They were naturally

inclined, therefore, to look impatiently upon a state of peace as an

unnatural condition of affairs which cut off all the profits of their

particular branch of industry, and condemned them both to idleness and

poverty. The Duke of Savoy had become one of the most experienced and

successful commanders of the age, and an especial favorite with the

Emperor. He had served with Alva in the campaigns against the Protestants

of Germany, and in other important fields. War being his element, he

considered peace as undesirable, although he could recognize its

existence. A truce he held, however, to be a senseless parodox, unworthy

of the slightest regard. An armistice, such as was concluded on the

February following the abdication, was, in his opinion, only to be turned

to account by dealing insidious and unsuspected blows at the enemy, some

portion of whose population might repose confidence in the plighted faith

of monarchs and plenipotentiaries. He had a show of reason for his

political and military morality, for he only chose to execute the evil

which had been practised upon himself. His father had been beggared, his

mother had died of spite and despair, he had himself been reduced from

the rank of a sovereign to that of a mercenary soldier, by spoliations

made in time of truce. He was reputed a man of very decided abilities,

and was distinguished for headlong bravery. His rashness and personal

daring were thought the only drawbacks to his high character as a

commander. He had many accomplishments. He spoke Latin, French, Spanish,

and Italian with equal fluency, was celebrated for his attachment to the

fine arts, and wrote much and with great elegance. Such had been

Philibert of Savoy, the pauper nephew of the powerful Emperor, the

adventurous and vagrant cousin of the lofty Philip, a prince without a

people, a duke without a dukedom; with no hope but in warfare, with no

revenue but rapine; the image, in person, of a bold and manly soldier,

small, but graceful and athletic, martial in bearing, "wearing his sword

under his arm like a corporal," because an internal malady made a belt

inconvenient, and ready to turn to swift account every chance which a new

series of campaigns might open to him. With his new salary as governor,

his pensions, and the remains of his possessions in Nice and Piedmont, he

had now the splendid annual income of one hundred thousand crowns, and

was sure to spend it all.

It had been the desire of Charles to smooth the commencement of Philip's

path. 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 whole

political system. The Emperor and conqueror, who had been warring all his

lifetime, had attempted, as the last act of his reign, to improvise a

peace. But it was not so easy to arrange a pacification of Europe as

dramatically as he desired, in order that he might gather his robes about

him, and allow the curtain to fall upon his eventful history in a grand

hush of decorum and quiet. During the autumn and winter of 1555,

hostilities had been virtually suspended, and languid negotiations

ensued. For several months armies confronted each other without engaging,

and diplomatists fenced among themselves without any palpable result. At

last the peace commissioners, who had been assembled at Vaucelles since

the beginning of the year 1556, signed a treaty of truce rather than of

peace, 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, throughout

all the dominions of the French and Spanish monarchs. The Pope was

expressly included in the truce, which was signed on the part of France

by Admiral Coligny and Sebastian l'Aubespine; on that of Spain, by Count

de Lalain, Philibert de Bruxelles, Simon Renard, and Jean Baptiste

Sciceio, a jurisconsult of Cremona. During the precious month of

December, however, the Pope had concluded with the French monarch a

treaty, by which this solemn armistice was rendered an egregious farce.

While Henry's plenipotentiaries had been plighting their faith to those

of Philip, it had been arranged that France should sustain, by subsidies

and armies, the scheme upon which Paul was bent, to drive the Spaniards

entirely 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 of

the confiscated realms of Philip. When was France ever slow to sweep upon

Italy with such a hope? How could the ever-glowing rivalry of Valois and

Habsburg fail to burst into a general conflagration, while the venerable

vicegerent of Christ stood thus beside them with his fan in his hand?

For a brief breathing space, however, the news of the pacification

occasioned much joy in the provinces. They rejoiced even in a temporary

cessation of that long series of campaigns from which they could

certainly derive no advantage, and in which their part was to furnish

money, soldiers, and battlefields, without prospect of benefit from any

victory, however brilliant, or any treaty, however elaborate.

Manufacturing, agricultural and commercial provinces, filled to the full

with industrial life, could not but be injured by being converted into

perpetual camps. All was joy in the Netherlands, while at Antwerp, the

great commercial metropolis of the provinces and of Europe, the rapture

was unbounded. Oxen were roasted whole in the public squares; the

streets, soon to be empurpled with the best blood of her citizens, ran

red with wine; a hundred triumphal arches adorned the pathway of Philip

as he came thither; and a profusion of flowers, although it was February,

were strewn before his feet. Such was his greeting in the light-hearted

city, but the countenance was more than usually sullen with which the

sovereign received these demonstrations of pleasure. It was thought by

many that Philip had been really disappointed in the conclusion of the

armistice, that he was inspired with a spark of that martial ambition for

which his panegyrists gave him credit, and that knowing full well the

improbability of a long suspension of hostilities, he was even eager for

the chance of conquest which their resumption would afford him. The

secret treaty of the Pope was of course not so secret but that the hollow

intention of the contracting parties to the truce of Vaucelles were

thoroughly suspected; intentions which certainly went far to justify the

maxims and the practice of the new governor-general of the Netherlands

upon the subject of armistices.

Philip, understanding his position, was revolving renewed military

projects while his subjects were ringing merry bells and lighting

bonfires in the Netherlands. These schemes, which were to be carried out

in the immediate future, caused, however, a temporary delay in the great

purpose to which he was to devote his life.

The Emperor had always desired to regard the Netherlands as a whole, and

he hated the antiquated charters and obstinate privileges which

interfered with his ideas of symmetry. Two great machines, the court of

Mechlin and the inquisition, would effectually simplify and assimilate

all these irregular and heterogeneous rights. The civil tribunal was to

annihilate all diversities in their laws by a general cassation of their

constitutions, and the ecclesiastical court was to burn out all

differences in their religious faith. Between two such millstones it was

thought that the Netherlands might be crushed into uniformity. Philip

succeeded to these traditions. The father had never sufficient leisure to

carry out all his schemes, but it seemed probable that the son would be a

worthy successor, at least in all which concerned the religious part of

his system. One of the earliest measures of his reign was to re-enact the

dread edict of 1550. This he did by the express advice of the Bishop of

Arras who represented to him the expediency of making use of the

popularity of his father's name, to sustain the horrible system resolved

upon. As Charles was the author of the edict, it could be always argued

that nothing new was introduced; that burning, hanging, and drowning for

religious differences constituted a part of the national institutions;

that they had received the sanction of the wise Emperor, and had been

sustained by the sagacity of past generations. Nothing could have been

more subtle, as the event proved, than this advice. Innumerable were the

appeals made in subsequent years, upon this subject, to the patriotism

and the conservative sentiments of the Netherlanders. Repeatedly they

were summoned to maintain the inquisition, on the ground that it had been

submitted to by their ancestors, and that no change had been made by

Philip, who desired only to maintain church and crown in the authority

which they had enjoyed in the days of his father of very laudable memory.

Nevertheless, the King's military plans seemed to interfere for the

moment with this cherished object. He seemed to swerve, at starting, from

pursuing the goal which he was only to abandon with life. The edict of

1550 was re-enacted and confirmed, and all office-holders were commanded

faithfully to enforce it upon pain of immediate dismissal. Nevertheless,

it was not vigorously carried into effect any where. It was openly

resisted in Holland, its proclamation was flatly refused in Antwerp, and

repudiated throughout Brabant. It was strange that such disobedience

should be tolerated, but the King wanted money. He was willing to refrain

for a season from exasperating the provinces by fresh religious

persecution at the moment when he was endeavoring to extort every penny

which it was possible to wring from their purses.

The joy, therefore, with which the pacification had been hailed by the

people was far from an agreeable spectacle to the King. The provinces

would expect that the forces which had been maintained at their expense

during the war would be disbanded, whereas he had no intention of

disbanding them. As the truce was sure to be temporary, he had no

disposition to diminish his available resources for a war which might be

renewed at any moment. To maintain the existing military establishment in

the Netherlands, a large sum of money was required, for the pay was very

much in arrear. The king had made a statement to the provincial estates

upon this subject, but the matter was kept secret during the negotiations

with 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 of

1556. 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 be

collected in three payments. The request, in so far as the imposition of

the 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. This

was finally accepted by Philip, after he had become convinced that at

this moment, when he was contemplating a war with France, it would be

extremely impolitic to insist upon the tax. The publication of the truce

in Italy had been long delayed, and the first infractions which it

suffered were committed in that country. The arts of politicians; the

schemes of individual ambition, united with the short-lived military

ardor of Philip to place the monarch in an eminently false position, that

of hostility to the Pope. As was unavoidable, the secret treaty of

December acted as an immediate dissolvent to the truce of February.

Great was the indignation of Paul Caraffa, when that truce was first

communicated to him by the Cardinal de Tournon, on the part of the French

Government. Notwithstanding the protestations of France that the secret

league was still binding, the pontiff complained that he was likely to be

abandoned to his own resources, and to be left single-handed to contend

with the vast power of Spain.

Pope Paul IV., of the house of Caraffa, was, in position, the well-known

counterpart of the Emperor Charles. At the very moment when the conqueror

and autocrat was exchanging crown for cowl, and the proudest throne of

the universe for a cell, this aged monk, as weary of scientific and

religious seclusion as Charles of pomp and power, had abdicated his

scholastic pre-eminence, and exchanged his rosary for the keys and sword.

A pontifical Faustus, he had become disgusted with the results of a life

of study and abnegation, and immediately upon his election appeared to be

glowing with mundane passions, and inspired by the fiercest ambition of a

warrior. He had rushed from the cloister as eagerly as Charles had sought

it. He panted for the tempests of the great external world as earnestly

as the conqueror who had so long ridden upon the whirlwind of human

affairs sighed for a haven of repose. None of his predecessors had been

more despotic, more belligerent, more disposed to elevate and strengthen

the temporal power of Rome. In the inquisition he saw the grand machine

by which this purpose could be accomplished, and yet found himself for a

period the antagonist of Philip. The single circumstance would have been

sufficient, had other proofs been wanting, to make manifest that the part

which he had chosen to play was above his genius. Had his capacity been

at all commensurate with his ambition, he might have deeply influenced

the fate of the world; but fortunately no wizard's charm came to the aid

of Paul Caraffa, and the triple-crowned monk sat upon the pontifical

throne, a fierce, peevish, querulous, and quarrelsome dotard; the prey

and the tool of his vigorous enemies and his intriguing relations. His

hatred of Spain and Spaniards was unbounded. He raved at them as

"heretics, schismatics, accursed of God, the spawn of Jews and Moors, the

very dregs of the earth." To play upon such insane passions was not

difficult, and a skilful artist stood ever ready to strike the chords

thus vibrating with age and fury. The master spirit and principal

mischief-maker of the papal court was the well-known Cardinal Caraffa,

once a wild and dissolute soldier, nephew to the Pope. He inflamed the

anger of the pontiff by his representations, that the rival house of

Colonna, sustained by the Duke of Alva, now viceroy of Naples, and by the

whole Spanish power, thus relieved from the fear of French hostilities,

would be free to wreak its vengeance upon their family. It was determined

that the court of France should be held by the secret league. Moreover,

the Pope had been expressly included in the treaty of Vaucelles, although

the troops of Spain had already assumed a hostile attitude in the south

of Italy. The Cardinal was for immediately proceeding to Paris, there to

excite the sympathy of the French monarch for the situation of himself

and his uncle. An immediate rupture between France and Spain, a

re-kindling of the war flames from one end of Europe to the other, were

necessary to save the credit and the interests of the Caraffas. Cardinal

de Tournon, not desirous of so sudden a termination to the pacific

relations between his, country and Spain, succeeded in detaining him a

little longer in Rome.--He remained, but not in idleness. The restless

intriguer had already formed close relations with the most important

personage in France, Diana of Poitiers.--This venerable courtesan, to the

enjoyment of whose charms Henry had succeeded, with the other regal

possessions, on the death of his father, was won by the flatteries of the

wily Caraffa, and by the assiduities of the Guise family. The best and

most sagacious statesmen, the Constable, and the Admiral, were in favor

of peace, for they knew the condition of the kingdom. The Duke of Guise

and the Cardinal Lorraine were for a rupture, for they hoped to increase

their family influence by war. Coligny had signed the treaty of

Vaucelles, and wished to maintain it, but the influence of the Catholic

party was in the ascendant. The result was to embroil the Catholic King

against the Pope and against themselves. The queen was as favorably

inclined as the mistress to listen to Caraffa, for Catherine de Medici

was desirous that her cousin, Marshal Strozzi, should have honorable and

profitable employment in some fresh Italian campaigns.

In the mean time an accident favored the designs of the papal court. An

open quarrel with Spain resulted from an insignificant circumstance. The

Spanish ambassador at Rome was in the habit of leaving the city very

often, at an early hour in the morning, upon shooting excursions, and had

long enjoyed the privilege of ordering the gates to be opened for him at

his pleasure. By accident or design, he was refused permission upon one

occasion to pass through the gate as usual. Unwilling to lose his day's

sport, and enraged at what he considered an indignity, his excellency, by

the aid of his attendants, attacked and beat the guard, mastered them,

made his way out of the city, and pursued his morning's amusement. The

Pope was furious, Caraffa artfully inflamed his anger. The envoy was

refused an audience, which he desired, for the sake of offering

explanations, and the train being thus laid, it was thought that the

right moment had arrived for applying the firebrand. The Cardinal went to

Paris post haste. In his audience of the King, he represented that his

Holiness had placed implicit reliance upon his secret treaty with his

majesty, that the recently concluded truce with Spain left the pontiff at

the mercy of the Spaniard, that the Duke of Alva had already drawn the

sword, that the Pope had long since done himself the pleasure and the

honor of appointing the French monarch protector of the papal chair in

general, and of the Caraffa family in particular, and that the moment had

arrived for claiming the benefit of that protection. He assured him,

moreover, as by full papal authority, that in respecting the recent truce

with Spain, his majesty would violate both human and divine law. Reason

and justice required him to defend the pontiff, now that the Spaniards

were about to profit by the interval of truce to take measures for his

detriment. Moreover, as the Pope was included in the truce of Vaucelles,

he could not be abandoned without a violation of that treaty itself.--The

arts and arguments of the Cardinal proved successful; the war was

resolved upon in favor of the Pope. The Cardinal, by virtue of powers

received and brought with him from his holiness, absolved the King from

all obligation to keep his faith with Spain. He also gave him a

dispensation from the duty of prefacing hostilities by a declaration of

war. Strozzi was sent at once into Italy, with some hastily collected

troops, while the Duke of Guise waited to organize a regular army.

The mischief being thus fairly afoot, and war let loose again upon

Europe, the Cardinal made a public entry into Paris, as legate of the

Pope. The populace crowded about his mule, as he rode at the head of a

stately procession through the streets. All were anxious to receive a

benediction from the holy man who had come so far to represent the

successor of St. Peter, and to enlist the efforts of all true believers

in his cause. He appeared to answer the entreaties of the superstitious

rabble with fervent blessings, while the friends who were nearest him

were aware that nothing but gibes and sarcasms were falling from his

lips. "Let us fool these poor creatures to their heart's content, since

they will be fools," he muttered; smiling the while upon them

benignantly, as became his holy office. Such were the materials of this

new combination; such was the fuel with which this new blaze was lighted

and maintained. Thus were the great powers of the earth--Spain, France,

England, and the Papacy embroiled, and the nations embattled against each

other for several years. The preceding pages show how much national

interests, or principles; were concerned in the struggle thus commenced,

in which thousands were to shed their life-blood, and millions to be

reduced from peace and comfort to suffer all the misery which famine and

rapine can inflict. It would no doubt have increased the hilarity of

Caraffa, as he made his triumphant entry into Paris, could the idea have

been suggested to his mind that the sentiments, or the welfare of the

people throughout the great states now involved in his meshes, could have

any possible bearing upon the question of peace or wax. The world was

governed by other influences. The wiles of a cardinal--the arts of a

concubine--the snipe-shooting of an ambassador--the speculations of a

soldier of fortune--the ill temper of a monk--the mutual venom of Italian

houses--above all, the perpetual rivalry of the two great historical

families who owned the greater part of Europe between them as their

private property--such were the wheels on which rolled the destiny of

Christendom. Compared to these, what were great moral and political

ideas, the plans of statesmen, the hopes of nations? Time was soon to

show. Meanwhile, government continued to be administered exclusively for

the benefit of the governors. Meanwhile, a petty war for paltry motives

was to precede the great spectacle which was to prove to Europe that

principles and peoples still existed, and that a phlegmatic nation of

merchants and manufacturers could defy the powers of the universe, and

risk all their blood and treasure, generation after generation, in a

sacred cause.

It does not belong to our purpose to narrate the details of the campaign

in Italy; neither is this war of politics and chicane of any great

interest at the present day. To the military minds of their age, the

scientific duel which now took place upon a large scale, between two such

celebrated captains as the Dukes of Guise and Alva, was no doubt esteemed

the most important of spectacles; but the progress of mankind in the art

of slaughter has stripped so antiquated an exhibition of most of its

interest, even in a technical point of view. Not much satisfaction could

be derived from watching an old-fashioned game of war, in which the

parties sat down before each other so tranquilly, and picked up piece

after piece, castle after castle, city after city, with such scientific

deliberation as to make it evident that, in the opinion of the

commanders, 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 that

when a general had a good job upon his hands he ought to know his

profession much too thoroughly, to hasten through it before he saw his

way clear to another. From the point of time, at the close of the year

1556, when that well-trained but not very successful soldier, Strozzi,

crossed the Alps, down to the autumn of the following year, when the Duke

of Alva made his peace with the Pope, there was hardly a pitched battle,

and scarcely an event of striking interest. Alva, as usual, brought his

dilatory policy to bear upon his adversary with great effect. He had no

intention, he observed to a friend, to stake the whole kingdom of Naples

against a brocaded coat of the Duke of Guise. Moreover, he had been sent

to the war, as Ruy Gomez informed the Venetian ambassador, "with a bridle

in his mouth." Philip, sorely troubled in his mind at finding himself in

so strange a position as this hostile attitude to the Church, had

earnestly interrogated all the doctors and theologians with whom he

habitually took counsel, whether this war with the Pope would not work a

forfeiture of his title of the Most Catholic King. The Bishop of Arras

and the favorite both disapproved of the war, and encouraged, with all

their influence, the pacific inclinations of the monarch. The doctors

were, to be sure, of opinion that Philip, having acted in Italy only in

self-defence, and for the protection of his states, ought not to be

anxious as to his continued right to the title on which he valued himself

so highly. Nevertheless, such ponderings and misgivings could not but

have the effect of hampering the actions of Alva. That general chafed

inwardly at what he considered his own contemptible position. At the same

time, he enraged the Duke of Guise still more deeply by the forced

calmness of his proceedings. Fortresses were reduced, towns taken, one

after another, with the most provoking deliberation, while his distracted

adversary in vain strove to defy, or to delude him, into trying the

chances of a stricken field. The battle of Saint Quentin, the narrative

of which belongs to our subject, and will soon occupy our attention, at

last decided the Italian operations. Egmont's brilliant triumph in

Picardy rendered a victory in Italy superfluous, and placed in Alva's

hand the power of commanding the issue of his own campaign. The Duke of

Guise was recalled to defend the French frontier, which the bravery of

the Flemish hero had imperilled, and the Pope was left to make the best

peace which he could. All was now prosperous and smiling, and the

campaign closed with a highly original and entertaining exhibition. The

pontiff's puerile ambition, sustained by the intrigues of his nephew, had

involved the French monarch in a war which was contrary to his interests

and inclination. Paul now found his ally too sorely beset to afford him

that protection upon which he had relied, when he commenced, in his

dotage, his career as a warrior. He was, therefore, only desirous of

deserting his friend, and of relieving himself from his uncomfortable

predicament, by making a treaty with his catholic majesty upon the best

terms which he could obtain. The King of France, who had gone to war only

for 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 a

desirable one for Philip. Alva was accordingly instructed to afford the

holy father a decorous and appropriate opportunity for carrying out his

wishes. The victorious general was apprized that his master desired no

fruit from his commanding attitude in Italy and the victory of Saint

Quentin, save a full pardon from the Pope for maintaining even a

defensive war against him. An amicable siege of Rome was accordingly

commenced, in the course of which an assault or "camiciata" on the holy

city, was arranged for the night of the 26th August, 1557. The pontiff

agreed to be taken by surprise--while Alva, through what was to appear

only a superabundance of his habitual discretion, was to draw off his

troops at the very moment when the victorious assault was to be made. The

imminent danger to the holy city and to his own sacred person thus

furnishing the pontiff with an excuse for abandoning his own cause, as

well as that of his ally the Duke of Alva was allowed, in the name of his

master and himself; to make submission to the Church and his peace with

Rome. The Spanish general, with secret indignation and disgust, was

compelled to humor the vanity of a peevish but imperious old man.

Negotiations were commenced, and so skilfully had the Duke played his

game during the spring and summer, that when he was admitted to kiss the

Pope's toe, he was able to bring a hundred Italian towns in his hand, as

a peace-offering to his holiness. These he now restored, with apparent

humility and inward curses, upon the condition that the fortifications

should be razed, and the French alliance absolutely renounced. Thus did

the fanaticism of Philip reverse the relative position of himself and his

antagonist. Thus was the vanquished pontiff allowed almost to dictate

terms to the victorious general. The king who could thus humble himself

to a dotard, while he made himself the scourge of his subjects, deserved

that the bull of excommunication which had been prepared should have been

fulminated. He, at least, was capable of feeling the scathing effects of

such anathemas.

The Duke of Guise, having been dismissed with the pontiff's assurance

that he had done little for the interests of his sovereign, less for the

protection of the Church, and least of all for his own reputation, set

forth with all speed for Civita Vecchia, to do what he could upon the

Flemish frontier to atone for his inglorious campaign in Italy. The

treaty between the Pope and the Duke of Alva was signed on the 14th

September (1557), and the Spanish general retired for the winter to

Milan. Cardinal Caraffa was removed from the French court to that of

Madrid, there to spin new schemes for the embroilment of nations and the

advancement of his own family. Very little glory was gained by any of the

combatants in this campaign. Spain, France, nor Paul IV., not one of them

came out of the Italian contest in better condition than that in which

they entered upon it. In fact all were losers. France had made an

inglorious retreat, the Pope a ludicrous capitulation, and the only

victorious party, the King of Spain, had, during the summer, conceded to

Cosmo de Medici the sovereignty of Sienna. Had Venice shown more

cordiality towards Philip, and more disposition to sustain his policy, it

is probable that the Republic would have secured the prize which thus

fell to the share of Cosmo. That astute and unprincipled potentate, who

could throw his net so well in troubled water, had successfully duped all

parties, Spain, France, and Rome. The man who had not only not

participated in the contest, but who had kept all parties and all warfare

away from his borders, was the only individual in Italy who gained

territorial advantage from the war.

To avoid interrupting the continuity of the narrative, the Spanish

campaign has been briefly sketched until the autumn of 1557, at which

period the treaty between the Pope and Philip was concluded. It is now

necessary 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 the

Emperor in covering the smouldering embers of national animosities so

precipitately, and with a view rather to scenic effect than to a

deliberate and well-considered result, were thus set at nought, and

within a year from the day of his abdication, hostilities were reopened

from the Tiber to the German Ocean. The blame of first violating the

truce of Vaucelles was laid by each party upon the other with equal

justice, for there can be but little doubt that the reproach justly

belonged to both. Both had been equally faithless in their professions of

amity. Both were equally responsible for the scenes of war, plunder, and

misery, which again were desolating the fairest regions of Christendom.

At the time when the French court had resolved to concede to the wishes

of the Caraffa family, Admiral Coligny, who had been appointed governor

of Picardy, had received orders to make a foray upon the frontier of

Flanders. Before the formal annunciation of hostilities, it was thought

desirable to reap all the advantage possible from the perfidy which had

been resolved upon.

It happened that a certain banker of Lucca, an ancient gambler and

debauchee, whom evil courses had reduced from affluence to penury, had

taken up his abode upon a hill overlooking the city of Douay. Here he had

built himself a hermit's cell. Clad in sackcloth, with a rosary at his

waist, he was accustomed to beg his bread from door to door. His garb was

all, however, which he possessed of sanctity, and he had passed his time

in contemplating the weak points in the defences of the city with much

more minuteness than those in his own heart. Upon the breaking out of

hostilities in Italy, the instincts of his old profession had suggested

to him that a good speculation might be made in Flanders, by turning to

account as a spy the observations which he had made in his character of a

hermit. He sought an interview with Coligny, and laid his propositions

before him. The noble Admiral hesitated, for his sentiments were more

elevated than those of many of his contemporaries. He had, moreover,

himself negotiated and signed the truce with Spain, and he shrank from

violating it with his own hand, before a declaration of war. Still he was

aware that a French army was on its way to attack the Spaniards in Italy;

he was under instructions to take the earliest advantage which his

position upon the frontier might offer him; he knew that both theory and

practice authorized a general, in that age, to break his fast, even in

time of truce, if a tempting morsel should present itself; and, above

all, he thoroughly understood the character of his nearest antagonist,

the new governor of the Netherlands, Philibert of Savoy, whom he knew to

be the most unscrupulous chieftain in Europe. These considerations

decided him to take advantage of the hermit-banker's communication.

A day was accordingly fixed, at which, under the guidance of this

newly-acquired ally, a surprise should be attempted by the French forces,

and the unsuspecting city of Douay given over to the pillage of a brutal

soldiery. The time appointed was the night of Epiphany, upon occasion of

which festival, it was thought that the inhabitants, overcome with sleep

and wassail, might be easily overpowered. (6th January, 1557.) The plot

was a good plot, but the Admiral of France was destined to be foiled by

an old woman. This person, apparently the only creature awake in the

town, perceived the danger, ran shrieking through the streets, alarmed

the citizens while it was yet time, and thus prevented the attack.

Coligny, disappointed in his plan, recompensed his soldiers by a sudden

onslaught upon Lens in Arthois, which he sacked and then levelled with

the ground. Such was the wretched condition of frontier cities, standing,

even in time of peace, with the ground undermined beneath them, and

existing every moment, as it were, upon the brink of explosion.

Hostilities having been thus fairly commenced, the French government was

in some embarrassment. The Duke of Guise, with the most available forces

of the kingdom, having crossed the Alps, it became necessary forthwith to

collect another army. The place of rendezvous appointed was Pierrepoint,

where an army of eighteen thousand infantry and five thousand horse were

assembled early in the spring. In the mean time, Philip finding the war

fairly afoot, had crossed to England for the purpose (exactly in

contravention of all his marriage stipulations) of cajoling his wife and

browbeating her ministers into a participation in his war with France.

This was easily accomplished. The English nation found themselves

accordingly engaged in a contest with which they had no concern, which,

as the event proved, was very much against their interests, and in which

the moving cause for their entanglement was the devotion of a weak, bad,

ferocious woman, for a husband who hated her. A herald sent from England

arrived in France, disguised, and was presented to King Henry at Rheims.

Here, dropping on one knee, he recited a list of complaints against his

majesty, on behalf of the English Queen, all of them fabricated or

exaggerated for the occasion, and none of them furnishing even a decorous

pretext for the war which was now formally declared in consequence. The

French monarch expressed his regret and surprise that the firm and

amicable relations secured by treaty between the two countries should

thus, without sufficient cause, be violated. In accepting the wager of

warfare thus forced upon him, he bade the herald, Norris, inform his

mistress that her messenger was treated with courtesy only because he

represented a lady, and that, had he come from a king, the language with

which he would have been greeted would have befitted the perfidy

manifested on the occasion. God would punish this shameless violation of

faith, and this wanton interruption to the friendship of two great

nations. With this the herald was dismissed from the royal presence, but

treated with great distinction, conducted to the hotel of the English

ambassador, and presented, on the part of the French sovereign with a

chain of gold.

Philip had despatched Ruy Gomez to Spain for the purpose of providing

ways and means, while he was himself occupied with the same task in

England. He stayed there three months. During this time, he "did more,"

says a Spanish contemporary, "than any one could have believed possible

with that proud and indomitable nation. He caused them to declare war

against France with fire and sword, by sea and land." Hostilities having

been thus chivalrously and formally established, the Queen sent an army

of eight thousand men, cavalry, infantry, and pioneers, who, "all clad in

blue uniform," commanded by Lords Pembroke and Clinton, with the three

sons of the Earl of Northumberland, and officered by many other scions of

England's aristocracy, disembarked at Calais, and shortly afterwards

joined the camp before Saint Quentin.

Philip meantime had left England, and with more bustle and activity than

was usual with him, had given directions for organizing at once a

considerable army. It was composed mainly of troops belonging to the

Netherlands, with the addition of some German auxiliaries. Thirty-five

thousand foot and twelve thousand horse had, by the middle of July,

advanced through the province of Namur, and were assembled at Givet under

the Duke of Savoy, who, as Governor-General of the Netherlands, held the

chief 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 the

Count of Egmont.

Lamoral, Count of Egmont, Prince of Gavere, was now in the thirty-sixth

year of his age, in the very noon of that brilliant life which was

destined to be so soon and so fatally overshadowed. Not one of the dark

clouds, which were in the future to accumulate around him, had yet rolled

above his horizon. Young, noble, wealthy, handsome, valiant, he saw no

threatening phantom in the future, and caught eagerly at the golden

opportunity, which the present placed within his grasp, of winning fresh

laurels on a wider and more fruitful field than any in which he had

hitherto been a reaper. The campaign about to take place was likely to be

an imposing, if not an important one, and could not fail to be attractive

to a noble of so ardent and showy a character as Egmont. If there were no

lofty principles or extensive interests to be contended for, as there

certainly were not, there was yet much that was stately and exciting to

the imagination in the warfare which had been so deliberately and

pompously arranged. The contending armies, although of moderate size,

were composed of picked troops, and were commanded by the flower of

Europe's chivalry. Kings, princes, and the most illustrious paladins of

Christendom, were arming for the great tournament, to which they had been

summoned by herald and trumpet; and the Batavian hero, without a crown or

even a country, but with as lofty a lineage as many anointed sovereigns

could 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 title

by which he was most familiarly known. He was supposed to trace his

descent, through a line of chivalrous champions and crusaders, up to the

pagan kings of the most ancient of existing Teutonic races. The eighth

century names of the Frisian Radbold and Adgild among his ancestors were

thought to denote the antiquity of a house whose lustre had been

increased in later times by the splendor of its alliances. His father,

united to Francoise de Luxemburg, Princess of Gavere, had acquired by

this marriage, and transmitted to his posterity, many of the proudest

titles and richest estates of Flanders. Of the three children who

survived him, the only daughter was afterwards united to the Count of

Vaudemont, and became mother of Louise de Vaudemont, queen of the French

monarch, 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 enough

to bear arms he demanded and obtained permission to follow the career of

his adventurous sovereign. He served his apprenticeship as a soldier in

the stormy expedition to Barbary, where, in his nineteenth year, he

commanded a troop of light horse, and distinguished himself under the

Emperor's eye for his courage and devotion, doing the duty not only of a

gallant commander but of a hardy soldier. Returning, unscathed by the

war, flood, or tempest of that memorable enterprise, he reached his

country by the way of Corsica, Genoa, and Lorraine, and was three years

afterwards united (in the year 1545) to Sabina of Bavaria, sister of

Frederick, Elector Palatine. The nuptials had taken place at Spiers, and

few royal weddings could have been more brilliant. The Emperor, his

brother Ferdinand King of the Romans, with the Archduke Maximilian, all

the imperial electors, and a concourse of the principal nobles of the

empire, were present on the occasion been at the Emperor's side during

the unlucky siege of Metz; in 1554 he had been sent at the head of a

splendid embassy to England, to solicit for Philip the hand of Mary

Tudor, and had witnessed the marriage in Winchester Cathedral, the same

year. Although one branch of his house had, in past times, arrived at the

sovereignty of Gueldres, and another had acquired the great estates and

titles of Buren, which had recently passed, by intermarriage with the

heiress, into the possession of the Prince of Orange, yet the Prince of

Gavere, Count of Egmont, was the chief of a race which yielded to none of

the great Batavian or Flemish families in antiquity, wealth, or power.

Personally, he was distinguished for his bravery, and although he was not

yet the idol of the camp, which he was destined to become, nor had yet

commanded in chief on any important occasion, he was accounted one of the

five principal generals in the Spanish service. Eager for general

admiration, he was at the same time haughty and presumptuous, attempting

to combine the characters of an arrogant magnate and a popular chieftain.

Terrible and sudden in his wrath, he was yet of inordinate vanity, and

was easily led by those who understood his weakness. With a limited

education, and a slender capacity for all affairs except those relating

to the camp, he was destined to be as vacillating and incompetent as a

statesman, as he was prompt and fortunately audacious in the field. A

splendid soldier, his evil stars had destined him to tread, as a

politician, a dark and dangerous path, in which not even genius, caution,

and integrity could ensure success, but in which rashness alternating

with hesitation, and credulity with violence, could not fail to bring

ruin. Such was Count Egmont, as he took his place at the-head of the

king's cavalry in the summer of 1557.

The early operations of the Duke of Savoy were at first intended to

deceive the enemy. The army, after advancing as far into Picardy as the

town of Vervins, which they burned and pillaged, made a demonstration

with their whole force upon the city of Guise. This, however, was but a

feint, by which attention was directed and forces drawn off from Saint

Quentin, which was to be the real point of attack In the mean time, the

Constable of France, Montmorency, arrived upon the 28th July (1557), to

take command of the French troops. He was accompanied by the Marechal de

Saint Andre and by Admiral Coligny. The most illustrious names of France,

whether for station or valor, were in the officers' list of this select

army. Nevers and Montpensier, Enghien and Conde, Vendome and

Rochefoucauld, were already there, and now the Constable and the Admiral

came to add the strength of their experience and lofty reputation to

sustain the courage of the troops. The French were at Pierrepoint, a post

between Champagne and Picardy, and in its neighborhood. The Spanish army

was at Vervins, and threatening Guise. It had been the opinion in France

that the enemy's intention was to invade Champagne, and the Duc de

Nevers, governor of that province, had made a disposition of his forces

suitable for such a contingency. It was the conviction of Montmorency,

however, that Picardy was to be the quarter really attacked, and that

Saint Quentin, which was the most important point at which the enemy's

progress, by that route, towards Paris could be arrested, was in imminent

danger. The Constable's opinion was soon confirmed by advices received by

Coligny. The enemy's army, he was informed, after remaining three days

before Guise, had withdrawn from that point, and had invested Saint

Quentin with their whole force.

This wealthy and prosperous city stood upon an elevation rising from the

river Somme. It was surrounded by very extensive suburbs, ornamented with

orchards and gardens, and including within their limits large tracts of a

highly cultivated soil. Three sides of the place were covered by a lake,

thirty yards in width, very deep at some points, in others, rather

resembling a morass, and extending on the Flemish side a half mile beyond

the city. The inhabitants were thriving and industrious; many of the

manufacturers and merchants were very rich, for it was a place of much

traffic and commercial importance.

Teligny, son-in-law of the Admiral, was in the city with a detachment of

the Dauphin's regiment; Captain Brueuil was commandant of the town. Both

informed Coligny of the imminent peril in which they stood. They

represented the urgent necessity of immediate reinforcements both of men

and supplies. The city, as the Admiral well knew, was in no condition to

stand a siege by such an army, and dire were the consequences which would

follow the downfall of so important a place. It was still practicable,

they wrote, to introduce succor, but every day diminished the possibility

of affording effectual relief. Coligny was not the man to let the grass

grow under his feet, after such an appeal in behalf of the principal

place in his government. The safety of France was dependent upon that of

St. Quentin. The bulwark overthrown, Paris was within the next stride of

an adventurous enemy. The Admiral instantly set out, upon the 2d of

August, with strong reinforcements. It was too late. The English

auxiliaries, under Lords Pembroke, Clinton, and Grey, had, in the mean

time, effected their junction with the Duke of Savoy, and appeared in the

camp before St. Quentin. The route, by which it had been hoped that the

much needed succor could be introduced, was thus occupied and rendered

impracticable. The Admiral, however, in consequence of the urgent nature

of the letters received from Brueuil and Teligny, had outstripped, in his

anxiety, the movements of his troops. He reached the city, almost alone

and unattended. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of his officers, he had

listened to no voice save the desperate entreaties of the besieged

garrison, and had flown before his army. He now shut himself up in the

city, determined to effect its deliverance by means of his skill and

experience, or, at least, to share its fate. As the gates closed upon

Coligny, the road was blocked up for his advancing troops.

A few days were passed in making ineffectual sorties, ordered by Coligny

for the sake of reconnoitring the country, and of discovering the most

practicable means of introducing supplies. The Constable, meantime, who

had advanced with his army to La Fore, was not idle. He kept up daily

communications with the beleagured Admiral, and was determined, if

possible, to relieve the city. There was, however, a constant succession

of disappointments. Moreover, the brave but indiscreet Teligny, who

commanded during a temporary illness of the Admiral, saw fit, against

express orders, to make an imprudent sortie. He paid the penalty of his

rashness with his life. He was rescued by the Admiral in person, who, at

imminent hazard, brought back the unfortunate officer covered with

wounds, into the city, there to die at his father's feet, imploring

forgiveness for his disobedience. Meantime the garrison was daily growing

weaker. Coligny sent out of the city all useless consumers, quartered all

the women in the cathedral and other churches, where they were locked in,

lest their terror and their tears should weaken the courage of the

garrison; and did all in his power to strengthen the defences of the

city, and sustain the resolution of the inhabitants. Affairs were growing

desperate. It seemed plain that the important city must soon fall, and

with it most probably Paris. One of the suburbs was already in the hands

of the enemy. At last Coligny discovered a route by which he believed it

to be still possible to introduce reinforcements. He communicated the

results of his observations to the Constable. Upon one side of the city

the lake, or morass, was traversed by a few difficult and narrow

pathways, mostly under water, and by a running stream which could only be

passed in boats. The Constable, in consequence of this information

received from Coligny, set out from La Fere upon the 8th of August, with

four thousand infantry and two thousand horse. Halting his troops at the

village of Essigny, he advanced in person to the edge of the morass, in

order to reconnoitre the ground and prepare his plans. The result was a

determination to attempt the introduction of men and supplies into the

town 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 his

preparations. Coligny in the mean time was to provide boats for crossing

the stream. Upon the 10th August, which was the festival of St. Laurence,

the Constable advanced with four pieces of heavy artillery, four

culverines, and four lighter pieces, and arrived at nine o'clock in the

morning near the Faubourg d'Isle, which was already in possession of the

Spanish troops. The whole army of the Constable consisted of twelve

thousand German, with fifteen companies of French infantry; making in all

some sixteen thousand foot, with five thousand cavalry in addition. The

Duke 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 was

to be executed in full view of the enemy. Fourteen companies of Spaniards

were stationed in the faubourg. Two companies had been pushed forward as

far as a water-mill, which lay in the pathway of the advancing Constable.

These soldiers stood their ground for a moment, but soon retreated, while

a cannonade was suddenly opened by the French upon the quarters of the

Duke of Savoy. The Duke's tent was torn to pieces, and he had barely time

to hurry on his cuirass, and to take refuge with Count Egmont. The

Constable, hastening to turn this temporary advantage to account at once,

commenced the transportation of his troops across the morass. The

enterprise was, however, not destined to be fortunate. The number of

boats which had been provided was very inadequate; moreover they were

very small, and each as it left the shore was consequently so crowded

with soldiers that it was in danger of being swamped. Several were

overturned, and the men perished. It was found also that the opposite

bank was steep and dangerous. Many who had crossed the river were unable

to effect a landing, while those who escaped drowning in the water lost

their way in the devious and impracticable paths, or perished miserably

in the treacherous quagmires. Very few effected their entrance into the

town, but among them was Andelot, brother of Coligny, with five hundred

followers. Meantime, a council of officers was held in Egmont's tent.

Opinions were undecided as to the course to be pursued under the

circumstances. Should an engagement be risked, or should the Constable,

who had but indifferently accomplished his project and had introduced but

an insignificant number of troops into the city, be allowed to withdraw

with the rest of his army? The fiery vehemence of Egmont carried all

before it. Here was an opportunity to measure arms at advantage with the

great captain of the age. To relinquish the prize, which the fortune of

war had now placed within reach of their valor, was a thought not to be

entertained. Here was the great Constable Montmorency, attended by

princes of the royal blood, the proudest of the nobility, the very crown

and flower of the chivalry of France, and followed by an army of her

bravest troops. On a desperate venture he had placed himself within their

grasp. Should he go thence alive and unmolested? The moral effect of

destroying such an army would be greater than if it were twice its actual

strength. It would be dealing a blow at the very heart of France, from

which she could not recover. Was the opportunity to be resigned without a

struggle of laying at the feet of Philip, in this his first campaign

since his accession to his father's realms, a prize worthy of the

proudest hour of the Emperor's reign? The eloquence of the impetuous

Batavian was irresistible, and it was determined to cut off the

Constable's retreat.

Three miles from the Faubourg d'Isle, to which that general had now

advanced, was a narrow pass or defile, between steep and closely hanging

hills. While advancing through this ravine in the morning, the Constable

had observed that the enemy might have it in their power to intercept his

return at that point. He had therefore left the Rhinegrave, with his

company of mounted carabineers, to guard the passage. Being ready to

commence his retreat, he now sent forward the Due de Nevers, with four

companies of cavalry to strengthen that important position, which he

feared might be inadequately guarded. The act of caution came too late.

This was the fatal point which the quick glance of Egmont had at once

detected. As Nevers reached the spot, two thousand of the enemy's cavalry

rode through and occupied the narrow passage. Inflamed by mortification

and despair, Nevers would have at once charged those troops, although

outnumbering his own by nearly, four to one. His officers restrained him

with difficulty, recalling to his memory the peremptory orders which he

had received from the Constable to guard the passage, but on no account

to hazard an engagement, until sustained by the body of the army. It was

a case in which rashness would have been the best discretion. The

headlong charge which the Duke had been about to make, might possibly

have cleared the path and have extricated the army, provided the

Constable 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 of

Spanish and Flemish cavalry, while Nevers slowly and reluctantly fell

back upon the Prince of Conde, who was stationed with the light horse at

the mill where the first skirmish had taken place. They were soon joined

by the Constable, with the main body of the army. The whole French force

now commenced its retrograde movement. It was, however, but too evident

that they were enveloped. As they approached the fatal pass through which

lay their only road to La Fire, and which was now in complete possession

of the enemy, the signal of assault was given by Count Egmont. That

general himself, at the head of two thousand light horse, led the charge

upon the left flank. The other side was assaulted by the Dukes Eric and

Henry of Brunswick, each with a thousand heavy dragoons, sustained by

Count Horn, at the head of a regiment of mounted gendarmerie. Mansfeld,

Lalain, Hoogstraaten; and Vilain, at the same time made a furious attack

upon the front. The French cavalry wavered with the shock so vigorously

given. The camp followers, sutlers, and pedlers, panic-struck, at once

fled helter-skelter, and in their precipitate retreat, carried confusion

and dismay throughout all the ranks of the army. The rout was sudden and

total. The onset and the victory were simultaneous, Nevers riding through

a hollow with some companies of cavalry, in the hope of making a detour

and presenting a new front to the enemy, was overwhelmed at once by the

retreating French and their furious pursuers. The day was lost, retreat

hardly possible, yet, by a daring and desperate effort, the Duke,

accompanied by a handful of followers, cut his way through the enemy and

effected his escape. The cavalry had been broken at the first onset and

nearly destroyed. A portion of the infantry still held firm, and

attempted to continue their retreat. Some pieces of artillery, however,

now opened upon them, and before they reached Essigny, the whole army was

completely annihilated. The defeat was absolute. Half the French troops

actually engaged in the enterprise, lost their lives upon the field. The

remainder of the army was captured or utterly disorganized. When Nevers

reviewed, at Laon, the wreck of the Constable's whole force, he found

some thirteen hundred French and three hundred German cavalry, with four

companies of French infantry remaining out of fifteen, and four thousand

German foot remaining of twelve thousand. Of twenty-one or two thousand

remarkably fine and well-appointed troops, all but six thousand had been

killed or made prisoners within an hour. The Constable himself, with a

wound in the groin, was a captive. The Duke of Enghien, after behaving

with brilliant valor, and many times rallying the troops, was shot

through the body, and brought into the enemy's camp only to expire. The

Due de Montpensier, the Marshal de Saint Andre, the Due de Loggieville,

Prince Ludovic of Mantua, the Baron Corton, la Roche du Mayne, the

Rhinegrave, the Counts de Rochefoucauld, d'Aubigni, de Rochefort, all

were taken. The Due de Nevers, the Prince of Conde, with a few others,

escaped; although so absolute was the conviction that such an escape was

impossible, that it was not believed by the victorious army. When Nevers

sent a trumpet, after the battle, to the Duke of Savoy, for the purpose

of negotiating concerning the prisoners, the trumpeter was pronounced an

impostor, and the Duke's letter a forgery; nor was it till after the

whole field had been diligently searched for his dead body without

success, that Nevers could persuade the conquerors that he was still in

existence.

Of Philip's army but fifty lost their lives. Lewis of Brederode was

smothered in his armor; and the two counts Spiegelberg and Count Waldeck

were also killed; besides these, no officer of distinction fell. All the

French standards and all their artillery but two pieces were taken, and

placed before the King, who the next day came into the camp before Saint

Quentin. The prisoners of distinction were likewise presented to him in

long procession. Rarely had a monarch of Spain enjoyed a more signal

triumph than this which Philip now owed to the gallantry and promptness

of Count Egmont.

While the King stood reviewing the spoils of victory, a light horseman of

Don Henrico Manrique's regiment approached, and presented him with a

sword. "I am the man, may it please your Majesty," said the trooper, "who

took the Constable; here is his sword; may your Majesty be pleased to

give 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 the

custom universally recognized in that day, that the king was the king's

captive, and the general the general's, but that the man, whether soldier

or officer, who took the commander-in-chief, was entitled to ten thousand

ducats. Upon this occasion the Constable was the prisoner of Philip,

supposed to command his own army in person. A certain Spanish Captain

Valenzuela, however, disputed the soldier's claim to the Constable's

sword. The trooper advanced at once to the Constable, who stood there

with the rest of the illustrious prisoners. "Your excellency is a

Christian," said he; "please to declare upon your conscience and the

faith of a cavalier, whether 't was I that took you prisoner. It need not

surprise your excellency that I am but a soldier, since with soldiers his

Majesty must wage his wars." "Certainly," replied the Constable, "you

took me and took my horse, and I gave you my sword. My word, however, I

pledged to Captain Valenzuela." It appearing, however, that the custom of

Spain 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 ten

thousand ducats to the captain. Thus the dispute ended.

Such was the brilliant victory of Saint Quentin, worthy to be placed in

the same list with the world-renowned combats of Creqy and Agincourt.

Like those battles, also, it derives its main interest from the personal

character of the leader, while it seems to have been hallowed by the

tender emotions which sprang from his subsequent fate. The victory was

but a happy move in a winning game. The players were kings, and the

people were stakes--not parties. It was a chivalrous display in a war

which was waged without honorable purpose, and in which no single lofty

sentiment was involved. The Flemish frontier was, however, saved for the

time from the misery which was now to be inflicted upon the French

border. This was sufficient to cause the victory to be hailed as

rapturously by the people as by the troops. From that day forth the name

of the brave Hollander was like the sound of a trumpet to the army.

"Egmont and Saint Quentin" rang through every mouth to the furthest

extremity of Philip's realms. A deadly blow was struck to the very heart

of 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 had

ever disgraced the history of France.

The fame and power of the Constable faded--his misfortunes and captivity

fell like a blight upon the ancient glory of the house of

Montmorency--his enemies destroyed his influence and his

popularity--while the degradation of the kingdom was simultaneous with

the downfall of his illustrious name. On the other hand, the exultation

of Philip was as keen as his cold and stony nature would permit. The

magnificent palace-convent of the Escurial, dedicated to the saint on

whose festival the battle had been fought, and built in the shape of the

gridiron, on which that martyr had suffered, was soon afterwards erected

in pious commemoration of the event. Such was the celebration of the

victory. The reward reserved for the victor was to be recorded on a later

page of history.

The coldness and caution, not to say the pusillanimity of Philip,

prevented him from seizing the golden fruits of his triumph. Ferdinand

Gonzaga wished the blow to be followed up by an immediate march upon

Paris.--Such was also the feeling of all the distinguished soldiers of

the 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 he

was, in the place of his son. He could not conceal his rage and

mortification when he found that Paris had not fallen, and is said to

have refused to read the despatches which recorded that the event had not

been consummated. There was certainly little of the conqueror in Philip's

nature; nothing which would have led him to violate the safest principles

of strategy. He was not the man to follow up enthusiastically the blow

which had been struck; Saint Quentin, still untaken, although defended by

but eight hundred soldiers, could not be left behind him; Nevers was

still in his front, and although it was notorious that he commanded only

the wreck of an army, yet a new one might be collected, perhaps, in time

to embarrass the triumphant march to Paris. Out of his superabundant

discretion, accordingly, Philip refused to advance till Saint Quentin

should be reduced.

Although nearly driven to despair by the total overthrow of the French in

the recent action, Coligny still held bravely out, being well aware that

every day by which the siege could be protracted was of advantage to his

country. Again he made fresh attempts to introduce men into the city. A

fisherman showed him a submerged path, covered several feet deep with

water, through which he succeeded in bringing one hundred and fifty

unarmed and half-drowned soldiers into the place. His garrison consisted

barely of eight hundred men, but the siege was still sustained, mainly by

his courage and sagacity, and by the spirit of his brother Andelot. The

company of cavalry, belonging to the Dauphin's regiment, had behaved

badly, and even with cowardice, since the death of their commander

Teligny. The citizens were naturally weary and impatient of the siege.

Mining and countermining continued till the 21st August. A steady

cannonade was then maintained until the 27th. Upon that day, eleven

breaches having been made in the walls, a simultaneous assault was

ordered 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 was

effected through a tower which had been thought sufficiently strong, and

which had been left unguarded. Coligny, rushing to the spot, engaged the

enemy almost single-handed. He was soon overpowered, being attended only

by four men and a page, was made a prisoner by a soldier named Francisco

Diaz, and conducted through one of the subterranean mines into the

presence of the Duke of Savoy, from whom the captor received ten thousand

ducats in exchange for the Admiral's sword. The fighting still continued

with great determination in the streets, the brave Andelot resisting to

the last. He was, however, at last overpowered, and taken prisoner.

Philip, who had, as usual, arrived in the trenches by noon, armed in

complete harness, with a page carrying his helmet, was met by the

intelligence that the city of Saint Quentin was his own.

To a horrible carnage succeeded a sack and a conflagration still more

horrible. In every house entered during the first day, every human being

was butchered. The sack lasted all that day and the whole of the

following, till the night of the 28th. There was not a soldier who did

not obtain an ample share of plunder, and some individuals succeeded in

getting possession of two, three, and even twelve thousand ducats each.

The women were not generally outraged, but they were stripped almost

entirely naked, lest they should conceal treasure which belonged to their

conquerors, and they were slashed in the face with knives, partly in

sport, partly as a punishment for not giving up property which was not in

their possession. The soldiers even cut off the arms of many among these

wretched women, and then turned them loose, maimed and naked, into the

blazing streets; for the town, on the 28th, was fired in a hundred

places, and was now one general conflagration. The streets were already

strewn with the corpses of the butchered garrison and citizens; while the

survivors were now burned in their houses. Human heads, limbs, and

trunks, were mingled among the bricks and rafters of the houses, which

were falling on every side. The fire lasted day and night, without an

attempt being made to extinguish it; while the soldiers dashed like

devils through flame and smoke in search of booty. Bearing lighted

torches, they descended into every subterrranean vault and receptacle, of

which there were many in the town, and in every one of which they hoped

to discover hidden treasure. The work of killing, plundering, and burning

lasted nearly three days and nights. The streets, meanwhile, were

encumbered with heaps of corpses, not a single one of which had been

buried since the capture of the town. The remains of nearly all the able

bodied male population, dismembered, gnawed by dogs or blackened by fire,

polluted the midsummer air meantime, the women had been again driven into

the cathedral, where they had housed during the siege, and where they now

crouched together in trembling expectation of their fate.' On the 29th

August, at two o'clock in the afternoon, Philip issued an order that

every woman, without an exception, should be driven out of the city into

the French territory. Saint Quentin, which seventy years before had been

a Flemish town, was to be re-annexed, and not a single man, woman, or

child who could speak the French language was to remain another hour in

the place. The tongues of the men had been effectually silenced. The

women, to the number of three thousand five hundred, were now compelled

to leave the cathedral and the city. Some were in a starving condition;

others had been desperately wounded; all, as they passed through the

ruinous streets of what had been their home, were compelled to tread upon

the unburied remains of their fathers, husbands, or brethren. To none of

these miserable creatures remained a living protector--hardly even a dead

body which could be recognized; and thus the ghastly procession of more

than three thousand women, many with gaping wounds in the face, many with

their arms cut off and festering, of all ranks and ages, some numbering

more than ninety years, bareheaded, with grey hair streaming upon their

shoulders; others with nursing infants in their arms, all escorted by a

company of heavy-armed troopers, left forever their native city. All made

the dismal journey upon foot, save that carts were allowed to transport

the children between the ages of two and six years. The desolation and

depopulation were now complete. "I wandered through the place, gazing at

all this," says a Spanish soldier who was present, and kept a diary of

all which occurred, "and it seemed to me that it was another destruction

of Jerusalem. What most struck me was to find not a single denizen of the

town left, who was or who dared to call himself French. How vain and

transitory, thought I, are the things of this world! Six days ago what

riches were in the city, and now remains not one stone upon another."

The expulsion of the women had been accomplished by the express command

of 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 sent

to the cathedral, whence he had caused the body of Saint Quentin to be

removed and placed in the royal tent. Here an altar, was arranged, upon

one side of which was placed the coffin of that holy personage, and upon

the other the head of the "glorious Saint Gregory" (whoever that glorious

individual may have been in life), together with many other relics

brought from the church. Within the sacred enclosure many masses were

said daily, while all this devil's work was going on without. The saint

who had been buried for centuries was comfortably housed and guarded by

the monarch, while dogs were gnawing the carcases of the freshly-slain

men of Saint Quentin, and troopers were driving into perpetual exile its

desolate and mutilated women.

The most distinguished captives upon this occasion were, of course,

Coligny and his brother. Andelot was, however, fortunate enough to make

his escape that night under the edge of the tent in which he was

confined. The Admiral was taken to Antwerp. Here he lay for many weeks

sick with a fever. Upon his recovery, having no better pastime, he fell

to reading the Scriptures. The result was his conversion to Calvinism;

and the world shudders yet at the fate in which that conversion involved

him.

Saint Quentin being thus reduced, Philip was not more disposed to push

his fortune. The time was now wasted in the siege of several

comparatively unimportant places, so that the fruits of Egmont's valor

were 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 receiving

two thousand shots from Philip's artillery, while Nojon, Chanly, and some

other places of less importance, were burned to the ground. After all

this smoke and fire upon the frontier, productive of but slender

consequences, Philip disbanded his army, and retired to Brussels. He

reached that city on the 12th October. The English returned to their own

country. The campaign of 1557 was closed without a material result, and

the victory of Saint Quentin remained for a season barren.

In the mean time the French were not idle. The army of the Constable had

been destroyed but the Duke de Guise, who had come post-haste from Italy

after hearing the news of Saint Quentin, was very willing to organize

another. He was burning with impatience both to retrieve his own

reputation, which had suffered some little damage by his recent Italian

campaign, and to profit by the captivity of his fallen rival the

Constable. During the time occupied by the languid and dilatory

proceedings of Philip in the autumn, the Duke had accordingly recruited

in France and Germany a considerable army. In January (1558) he was ready

to 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, but

to carry the war into the territory of the ally. It was fated that

England should bear all the losses, and Philip appropriate all the gain

and glory, which resulted from their united exertions. It was the war of

the Queen's husband, with which the Queen's people had no concern, but in

which the last trophies of the Black Prince were to be forfeited. On the

first January, 1558, the Duc de Guise appeared before Calais. The Marshal

Strozzi had previously made an expedition, in disguise, to examine the

place. The result of his examination was that the garrison was weak, and

that it relied too much upon the citadel. After a tremendous cannonade,

which lasted a week, and was heard in Antwerp, the city was taken by

assault. Thus the key to the great Norman portal of France, the

time-honored key which England had worn at her girdle since the eventful

day of Crecy, was at last taken from her. Calais had been originally won

after a siege which had lasted a twelvemonth, had been held two hundred

and ten years, and was now lost in seven days. Seven days more, and ten

thousand discharges from thirty-five great guns sufficed for the

reduction of Guines. Thus the last vestige of English dominion, the last

substantial pretext of the English sovereign to wear the title and the

lilies of France, was lost forever. King Henry visited Calais, which

after two centuries of estrangement had now become a French town again,

appointed Paul de Thermes governor of the place, and then returned to

Paris to celebrate soon afterwards the marriage of the Dauphin with the

niece of the Guises, Mary, Queen of Scots.

These events, together with the brief winter campaign of the Duke, which

had raised for an instant the drooping head of France, were destined

before long to give a new face to affairs, while it secured the

ascendancy of the Catholic party in the kingdom. Disastrous eclipse had

come 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 two

ecclesiastics, the Bishop of Arras and the Cardinal de Lorraine, took

place at Peronne. From this central point commenced the weaving of that

wide-spread scheme, in which the fate of millions was to be involved. The

Duchess Christina de Lorraine, cousin of Philip, had accompanied him to

Saint Quentin. Permission had been obtained by the Duc de Guise and his

brother, the Cardinal, to visit her at Peronne. The Duchess was

accompanied by the Bishop of Arras, and the consequence was a full and

secret negotiation between the two priests. It may be supposed that

Philip's short-lived military ardor had already exhausted itself. He had

mistaken his vocation, and already recognized the false position in which

he was placed. He was contending against the monarch in whom he might

find the surest ally against the arch enemy of both kingdoms, and of the

world. 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 ambitious

Cardinal. That prelate was assured that Philip considered the captivity

of Coligny and Montmorency a special dispensation of Providence, while

the tutelar genius of France, notwithstanding the reverses sustained by

that kingdom, was still preserved. The Cardinal and his brother, it was

suggested, now held in their hands the destiny of the kingdom, and of

Europe. The interests of both nations, of religion, and of humanity, made

it imperative upon them to put an end to this unnatural war, in order

that the two monarchs might unite hand and heart for the extirpation of

heresy. That hydra-headed monster had already extended its coils through

France, while its pestilential breath was now wafted into Flanders from

the German as well as the French border. Philip placed full reliance upon

the wisdom and discretion of the Cardinal. It was necessary that these

negotiations should for the present remain a profound secret; but in the

mean 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 it

could be by Henry. The Bishop was soon aware of the impression which his

artful suggestions had produced. The Cardinal, inspired by the flattery

thus freely administered, as well as by the promptings of his own

ambition, lent a willing ear to the Bishop's plans. Thus was laid the

foundation of a vast scheme, which time was to complete. A crusade with

the whole strength of the French and Spanish crowns, was resolved upon

against their own subjects. The Bishop's task was accomplished. The

Cardinal returned to France, determined to effect a peace with Spain. He

was convinced that the glory of his house was to be infinitely enhanced,

and its power impregnably established, by a cordial co-operation with

Philip in his dark schemes against religion and humanity. The

negotiations were kept, however, profoundly secret. A new campaign and

fresh humiliations were to precede the acceptance by France of the peace

which was thus proffered.

Hostile operations were renewed soon after the interview at Peronne. The

Duke of Guise, who had procured five thousand cavalry and fourteen

thousand infantry in Germany, now, at the desire of the King, undertook

an enterprise against Thionville, a city of importance and great strength

in Luxemburg, upon the river Moselle. It was defended by Peter de

Quarebbe, a gentleman of Louvain, with a garrison of eighteen hundred

men. On the 5th June, thirty-five pieces of artillery commenced the work;

the mining and countermining-continuing seventeen days; on the 22nd the

assault was made, and the garrison capitulated immediately afterwards. It

was a siege conducted in a regular and business-like way, but the details

possess no interest. It was, however, signalized by the death of one of

the eminent adventurers of the age, Marshal Strozzi. This brave, but

always unlucky soldier was slain by a musket ball while assisting the

Duke of Guise--whose arm was, at that instant, resting upon his

shoulder--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 himself

with the reduction of the unimportant places of Vireton and Arlon. Here

he loitered seventeen days, making no exertions to follow up the success

which had attended him at the opening of the campaign. The good fortune

of the French was now neutralized by the same languor which had marked

the movements of Philip after the victory of Saint Quentin. The time,

which might have been usefully employed in following up his success, was

now wasted by the Duke in trivial business, or in absolute torpor. This

may have been the result of a treacherous understanding with Spain, and

the 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. Having

assembled an army of some eight thousand foot and fifteen hundred horse,

partly Gascons and partly Germans, he was accordingly directed to ravage

the neighboring country, particularly the county of Saint Pol. In the

mean time, the Due de Guise, having reduced the cities on the southern

frontier, was to move in a northerly direction, make a junction with the

Marshal, and thus extend a barrier along the whole frontier of the

Netherlands.

De Therlries set forth from Calais, in the beginning of June, with his

newly-organized army. Passing by Gravelines and Bourbourg, he arrived

before Dunkerk on the 2d of July. The city, which was without a garrison,

opened negotiations, during the pendency of which it was taken by assault

and pillaged. The town of Saint Winochsberg shared the same fate. De

Thermes, who was a martyr to the gout, was obliged at this point

temporarily 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 at

Brussels, had directed the Duke of Savoy to oppose the Due de Guise with

an army which had been hastily collected and organized at Maubeuge, in

the province of Namur. He now desired, if possible, to attack and cut off

the forces of De Thermes before he should extend the hand to Guise, or

make good his retreat to Calais.

Flushed with victory over defenceless peasants, laden with the spoils of

sacked and burning towns, the army of De Thermes was already on its

homeward march. It was the moment for a sudden and daring blow. Whose arm

should deal it? What general in Philip's army possessed the requisite

promptness, and felicitous audacity; who, but the most brilliant of

cavalry officers, the bold and rapid hero of St. Quentin? Egmont, in

obedience to the King's command, threw himself at once into the field. He

hastily collected all the available forces in the neighborhood. These,

with drafts from the Duke of Savoy's army, and with detachments under

Marshal Bigonicourt from the garrisons of Saint Omer, Bethune, Aire, and

Bourbourg, soon amounted to ten thousand foot and two thousand horse. His

numbers were still further swollen by large bands of peasantry, both men

and women, maddened by their recent injuries, and thirsting for

vengeance. With these troops the energetic chieftain took up his position

directly in the path of the French army. Determined to destroy De Thermes

with all his force, or to sacrifice himself, he posted his army at

Gravelines, a small town lying near the sea-shore, and about midway

between Calais and Dunkerk. The French general was putting the finishing

touch to his expedition by completing the conflagration at Dunkerk, and

was moving homeward, when he became aware of the lion in his path.

Although suffering from severe sickness, he mounted his horse and

personally conducted his army to Gravelines. Here he found his progress

completely arrested. On that night, which was the 12th July, he held a

council of officers. It was determined to refuse the combat offered, and,

if possible, to escape at low tide along the sands toward Calais. The

next morning he crossed the river Aa, below Gravelines. Egmont, who was

not the man, on that occasion at least, to build a golden bridge for a

flying enemy, crossed the same stream just above the town, and drew up

his whole force in battle array. De Thermes could no longer avoid the

conflict 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 of

saving his army and his treasure. The sea was on his right hand, the Aa

behind him, the enemy in front. He piled his baggage and wagons so as to

form a barricade upon his left, and placed his artillery, consisting of

four culverines and three falconeta, in front. Behind these he drew up

his cavalry, supported at each side by the Gascons, and placed his French

and German infantry in the rear.

Egmont, on the other hand, divided his cavalry into five squadrons. Three

of light horse were placed in advance for the first assault--the centre

commanded by himself, the two wings by Count Pontenals and Henrico

Henriquez. The black hussars of Lazarus Schwendi and the Flemish

gendarmes came next. Behind these was the infantry, divided into three

nations, Spanish, German, and Flemish, and respectively commanded by

Carvajal, Monchausen, and Bignicourt. Egmont, having characteristically

selected the post of danger in the very front of battle for himself,

could no longer restrain his impatience. "The foe is ours already," he

shouted; "follow me, all who love their fatherland:" With that he set

spurs to his horse, and having his own regiment well in hand, dashed upon

the enemy. The Gascons received the charge with coolness, and under cover

of a murderous fire from the artillery in front, which mowed down the

foremost ranks of their assailants-sustained the whole weight of the

first onset without flinching. Egmont's horse was shot under him at the

commencement of the action. Mounting another, he again cheered his

cavalry to the attack. The Gascons still maintained an unwavering front,

and fought with characteristic ferocity. The courage of despair inflamed

the French, the hope of a brilliant and conclusive victory excited the

Spaniards and Flemings. It was a wild, hand to hand conflict--general and

soldier, cavalier and pikeman, lancer and musketeer, mingled together in

one dark, confused, and struggling mass, foot to foot, breast to breast,

horse to horse-a fierce, tumultuous battle on the sands, worthy the

fitful pencil of the national painter, Wouvermans. For a long time it was

doubtful on which side victory was to incline, but at last ten English

vessels unexpectedly appeared in the offing, and ranging up soon

afterwards as close to the share as was possible, opened their fire upon

the still unbroken lines of the French. The ships were too distant, the

danger of injuring friend as well as foe too imminent, to allow of their

exerting any important influence upon the result. The spirit of the enemy

was broken, however, by this attack upon their seaward side, which they

had thought impregnable. At the same time, too, a detachment of German

cavalry which had been directed by Egmont to make their way under the

downs to the southward, now succeeded in turning their left flank.

Egmont, profiting by their confusion, charged them again with redoubled

vigor. The fate of the day was decided. The French cavalry wavered, broke

their ranks, and in their flight carried dismay throughout the whole

army. The rout was total; horse and foot; French, Gascon, and German fled

from the field together. Fifteen hundred fell in the action, as many more

were driven into the sea, while great numbers were torn to pieces by the

exasperated peasants, who now eagerly washed out their recent injuries in

the blood of the dispersed, wandering, and wounded soldiers. The army of

De Thermes was totally destroyed, and with it, the last hope of France

for an honorable and equal negotiation. She was now at Philip's feet, so

that this brilliant cavalry action, although it has been surpassed in

importance by many others, in respect to the numbers of the combatants

and the principles involved in the contest, was still, in regard to the

extent both of its immediate and its permanent results, one of the most

decisive and striking which have ever been fought. The French army

engaged was annihilated. Marshal de Thermes, with a wound in the head,

Senarpont, Annibault, Villefon, Morvilliers, Chanlis, and many others of

high rank were prisoners. The French monarch had not much heart to set

about the organization of another army; a task which he was now compelled

to 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 the

archives of France.

The Marshal de Thermes was severely censured for having remained so long

at Dunkerk and in its neighborhood. He was condemned still more loudly

for not having at least effected his escape beyond Gravelines, during the

night which preceded the contest. With regard to the last charge,

however, it may well be doubted whether any nocturnal attempt would have

been likely to escape the vigilance of Egmont. With regard to his delay

at Dunkerk, it was asserted that he had been instructed to await in that

place the junction with the Due de Guise, which had been previously

arranged. But for the criminal and, then, inexplicable languor which

characterized that commander's movements, after the capture of

Thionville, the honor of France might still have been saved.

Whatever might have been the faults of De Thermes or of Guise, there

could be little doubt as to the merit of Egmont. Thus within eleven

months of the battle of Saint Quentin, had the Dutch hero gained another

victory so decisive as to settle the fate of the war, and to elevate his

sovereign to a position from which he might dictate the terms of a

triumphant peace. The opening scenes of Philip's reign were rendered as

brilliant as the proudest days of the Emperor's career, while the

provinces were enraptured with the prospect of early peace. To whom,

then, was the sacred debt of national and royal gratitude due but to

Lamoral of Egmont? His countrymen gladly recognized the claim. He became

the idol of the army; the familiar hero of ballad and story; the mirror

of chivalry, and the god of popular worship. Throughout the Netherlands

he was hailed as the right hand of the fatherland, the saviour of

Flanders from devastation and outrage, the protector of the nation, the

pillar of the throne.

The victor gained many friends by his victory, and one enemy. The

bitterness of that foe was likely, in the future, to outweigh all the

plaudits of his friends. The Duke of Alva had strongly advised against

giving battle to De Thermes. He depreciated the triumph after it had been

gained, by reflections upon the consequences which would have flowed, had

a defeat been suffered instead. He even held this language to Egmont

himself after his return to Brussels. The conqueror, flushed with his

glory, was not inclined to digest the criticism, nor what he considered

the venomous detraction of the Duke. More vain and arrogant than ever, he

treated his powerful Spanish rival with insolence, and answered his

observations with angry sarcasms, even in the presence of the King. Alva

was not likely to forget the altercation, nor to forgive the triumph.

There passed, naturally, much bitter censure and retort on both sides at

court, between the friends and adherents of Egmont and those who

sustained the party of his adversary. The battle of Gravelines was fought

over daily, amid increasing violence and recrimination, between Spaniard

and Fleming, and the old international hatred flamed more fiercely than

ever. Alva continued to censure the foolhardiness which had risked so

valuable an army on a single blow. Egmont's friends replied that it was

easy for foreigners, who had nothing at risk in the country, to look on

while the fields of the Netherlands were laid waste, and the homes and

hearths of an industrious population made desolate, by a brutal and

rapacious soldiery. They who dwelt in the Provinces would be ever

grateful to their preserver for the result. They had no eyes for the

picture which the Spanish party painted of an imaginary triumph of De

Thermos and its effects. However the envious might cavil, now that the

blow had been struck, the popular heart remained warm as ever, and

refused to throw down the idol which had so recently been set up.

1558-1559 [CHAPTER III.]

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 the

two Cardinals at Peronne having been sustained by Egmont's victory, all

parties were ready for a peace. King Henry was weary of the losing game

which he had so long been playing, Philip was anxious to relieve himself

from his false position, and to concentrate his whole mind and the

strength of his kingdom upon his great enemy the Netherland heresy, while

the Duke of Savoy felt that the time had at last arrived when an adroit

diplomacy might stand him in stead, and place him in the enjoyment of

those rights which the sword had taken from him, and which his own sword

had done so much towards winning back. The sovereigns were inclined to

peace, and as there had never been a national principle or instinct or

interest involved in the dispute, it was very certain that peace would be

popular every where, upon whatever terms it might be concluded.

Montmorency and the Prince of Orange were respectively empowered to open

secret negotiations. The Constable entered upon the task with alacrity,

because he felt that every day of his captivity was alike prejudicial to

his own welfare and the interests of his country.--The Guises, who had

quarrelled with the Duchess de Valentinois (Diane de Poitiers), were not

yet powerful enough to resist the influence of the mistress; while,

rather to baffle them than from any loftier reasons, that interest was

exerted in behalf of immediate peace. The Cardinal de Lorraine had by no

means forgotten the eloquent arguments used by the Bishop of Arras; but

his brother, the Due de Guise, may be supposed to have desired some

little opportunity of redeeming the credit of the kingdom, and to have

delayed the negotiations until his valor could secure a less inglorious

termination to the war.

A fresh army had, in fact, been collected under his command, and was

already organized at Pierrepoint. At the same time, Philip had assembled

a large force, consisting of thirty thousand foot and fifteen thousand

cavalry, with which he had himself taken the field, encamping towards the

middle of August upon the banks of the river Anthies, near the border of

Picardy. King Henry, on the other hand, had already arrived in the camp

at Pierrepoint, and had reviewed as imposing an army as had ever been at

the disposal of a French monarch. When drawn up in battle array it

covered a league and a half of ground, while three hours were required to

make its circuit on horseback. All this martial display was only for

effect. The two kings, at the head of their great armies, stood looking

at each other while the negotiations for, peace were proceeding. An

unimportant skirmish or two at the out-posts, unattended with loss of

life, were the only military results of these great preparations. Early

in the autumn, all the troops were disbanded, while the commissioners of

both 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 the

Prince of Orange, the Duke of Alva, the Bishop of Arras, Ruy Gomez de

Silva, the president Viglius; on that of the French monarch, the

Constable, the Marshal de Saint Andre, the Cardinal de Lorraine, the

Bishop of Orleans, and Claude l'Aubespine.

There were also envoys sent by the Queen of England, but as the dispute

concerning Calais was found to hamper the negotiations at Cercamp, the

English question was left to be settled by another congress, and was kept

entirely separate from the arrangements concluded between France and

Spain.

The death of Queen Mary, on the 17th November, caused a temporary

suspension of the proceedings. After the widower, however, had made a

fruitless effort to obtain the hand of her successor, and had been

unequivocally repulsed, the commissioners again met in February, 1559, at

Cateau Cambresis. The English difficulty was now arranged by separate

commissioners, and on the third of April a treaty between France and

Spain was concluded.

By this important convention, both kings bound themselves to maintain the

Catholic worship inviolate by all means in their power, and agreed that

an oecumenical council should at once assemble, to compose the religious

differences, and to extinguish the increasing heresy in both kingdoms.

Furthermore, it was arranged that the conquests made by each country

during the preceding eight years should be restored. Thus all the gains

of Francis and Henry were annulled by a single word, and the Duke of

Savoy converted, by a dash of the pen, from a landless soldier of fortune

into a sovereign again. He was to receive back all his estates, and was

moreover to marry Henry's sister Margaret, with a dowry of three hundred

thousand crowns. Philip, on the other hand, now a second time a widower,

was to espouse Henry's daughter Isabella, already betrothed to the Infant

Don Carlos, and to receive with her a dowry of four hundred thousand

crowns. The restitutions were to be commenced by Henry, and to be

completed within three months. Philip was to restore his conquests in the

course of a month afterwards.

Most of the powers of Europe were included by both parties in this

treaty: 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 other

inferior principalities. Nearly all Christendom, in short, was embraced

in 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's

subjects, to accompany him to Paris as pledges for the execution of all

the 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 a

war between France and Spain, which had been so wantonly undertaken.

Marshal Monluc wrote that a treaty so disgraceful and disastrous had

never before been ratified by a French monarch. It would have been

difficult to point to any one more unfortunate upon her previous annals;

if any treaty can be called unfortunate, by which justice is done and

wrongs repaired, even under coercion. The accumulated plunder of years,

which was now disgorged by France, was equal in value to one third of

that kingdom. One hundred and ninety-eight fortified towns were

surrendered, making, with other places of greater or less importance, a

total estimated by some writers as high as four hundred. The principal

gainer was the Duke of Savoy, who, after so many years of

knight-errantry, had regained his duchy, and found himself the

brother-in-law of his ancient enemy.

The well-known tragedy by which the solemnities of this pacification were

abruptly concluded in Paris, bore with it an impressive moral. The

monarch who, in violation of his plighted word and against the interests

of his nation and the world, had entered precipitately into a causeless

war, 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 by

Montgomery in the tournament held eleven days before. Of this weak and

worthless prince, all that even his flatterers could favorably urge was

his great fondness for war, as if a sanguinary propensity, even when

unaccompanied by a spark of military talent, were of itself a virtue.

Yet, with his death the kingdom fell even into more pernicious hands, and

the fate of Christendom grew darker than ever. The dynasty of Diane de

Poitiers was succeeded by that of Catharine de Medici; the courtesan gave

place to the dowager; and France during the long and miserable period in

which she lay bleeding in the grasp of the Italian she-wolf and her

litter of cowardly and sanguinary princes--might even lament the days of

Henry and his Diana. Charles the Ninth, Henry the Third, Francis of

Alencon, last of the Valois race--how large a portion of the fearful debt

which has not yet been discharged by half a century of revolution and

massacre was of their accumulation.

The Duchess of Valentinois had quarrelled latterly with the house of

Guise, and was disposed to favor Montmorency. The King, who was but a

tool in her hands, might possibly have been induced, had he lived, to

regard Coligny and his friends with less aversion. This is, however,

extremely problematical, for it was Henry the Second who had concluded

that memorable arrangement with his royal brother of Spain, to arrange

for the Huguenot chiefs throughout both realms, a "Sicilian Vespers,"

upon the first favorable occasion. His death and the subsequent policy of

the Queen-Regent deferred the execution of the great scheme till fourteen

years later. Henry had lived long enough, however, after the conclusion

of the secret agreement to reveal it to one whose life was to be employed

in thwarting this foul conspiracy of monarchs against their subjects.

William of Orange, then a hostage for the execution of the treaty of

Cateau Cambresis, was the man with whom the King had the unfortunate

conception to confer on the subject of the plot. The Prince, who had

already gained the esteem of Charles the Fifth by his habitual

discretion, knew how to profit by the intelligence and to bide his time;

but his hostility to the policy of the French and Spanish courts was

perhaps dated from that hour.

Pending the peace negotiations, Philip had been called upon to mourn for

his wife and father. He did not affect grief for the death of Mary Tudor,

but he honored the Emperor's departure with stately obsequies at

Brussels. The ceremonies lasted two days (the 29th and 30th December,

1558). In the grand and elaborate procession which swept through the

streets upon the first day, the most conspicuous object was a ship

floating apparently upon the waves, and drawn by a band of Tritons who

disported at the bows. The masts, shrouds, and sails of the vessel were

black, it was covered with heraldic achievements, banners and emblematic

mementos of the Emperor's various expeditions, while the flags of Turks

and Moors trailed from her sides in the waves below. Three allegorical

personages composed the crew. Hope, "all clothyd in brown, with anker in

hand," stood at the prow; Faith, with sacramental chalice and red cross,

clad in white garment, with her face nailed "with white tiffany," sat on

a "stool of estate" before the mizen-mast; while Charity "in red, holding

in her hand a burning heart," was at the helm to navigate the vessel.

Hope, Faith, and Love were thought the most appropriate symbols for the

man who had invented the edicts, introduced the inquisition, and whose

last words, inscribed by a hand already trembling with death, had adjured

his son, by his love, allegiance, and hope of salvation, to deal to all

heretics the extreme rigor of the law, "without respect of persons and

without regard to any plea in their favor."

The rest of the procession, in which marched the Duke of Alva, the Prince

of Orange, and other great personages, carrying the sword, the globe, the

sceptre, and the "crown imperial," contained no emblems or imagery worthy

of being recorded. The next day the King, dressed in mourning and

attended by a solemn train of high officers and nobles, went again to the

church. A contemporary letter mentions a somewhat singular incident as

forming the concluding part of the ceremony. "And the service being

done," wrote Sir Richard Clough to Sir Thomas Gresham, "there went a

nobleman into the herse (so far as I codde understande, it was the Prince

of Orange), who, standing before the herse, struck with his hand upon the

chest and sayd, 'He is ded.' Then standing styli awhile, he sayd, 'He

shall 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 ever

he was.' Whereupon the Kynge's hoode was taken off and the Kynge went

home 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 now

burst forth like a sudden illumination throughout the Netherlands, upon

the advent of peace. All was joy in the provinces, but at Antwerp, the

metropolis of the land, the enthusiasm was unbounded. Nine days were

devoted to festivities. Bells rang their merriest peals, artillery

thundered, beacons blazed, the splendid cathedral spire flamed nightly

with three hundred burning cresaets, the city was strewn with flowers and

decorated with triumphal arches, the Guilds of Rhetoric amazed the world

with their gorgeous processions, glittering dresses and bombastic

versification, the burghers all, from highest to humblest, were feasted

and made merry, wine flowed in the streets and oxen were roasted whole,

prizes on poles were climbed for, pigs were hunted blindfold, men and

women raced in sacks, and in short, for nine days long there was one

universal and spontaneous demonstration of hilarity in Antwerp and

throughout the provinces.

But with this merry humor of his subjects, the sovereign had but little

sympathy. There was nothing in his character or purposes which owed

affinity with any mood of this jocund and energetic people. Philip had

not made peace with all the world that the Netherlanders might climb on

poles or ring bells, or strew flowers in his path for a little holiday

time, and then return to their industrious avocations again. He had made

peace with all the world that he might be free to combat heresy; and this

arch enemy had taken up its strong hold in the provinces. The treaty of

Cateau Cambresis left him at liberty to devote himself to that great

enterprise. He had never loved the Netherlands, a residence in these

constitutional provinces was extremely irksome to him, and he was

therefore anxious to return to Spain. From the depths of his cabinet he

felt that he should be able to direct the enterprise he was resolved

upon, and that his presence in the Netherlands would be superfluous and

disagreeable.

The early part of the year 1559 was spent by Philip in organizing the

government of the provinces and in making the necessary preparations for

his departure. The Duke of Savoy, being restored to his duchy, had, of

course, no more leisure to act as Regent of the Netherlands, and it was

necessary, therefore, to fix upon his successor in this important post,

at once. There were several candidates. The Duchess Christina of Lorraine

had received many half promises of the appointment, which she was most

anxious to secure; the Emperor was even said to desire the nomination of

the Archduke Maximilian, a step which would have certainly argued more

magnanimity 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. The

Prince of Orange, however, was too sagacious to deceive himself long, and

became satisfied very soon that no Netherlander was likely to be selected

for Regent. He therefore threw his influence in favor of the Duchess

Christina, whose daughter, at the suggestion of the Bishop of Arras, he

was desirous of obtaining in marriage. The King favored for a time, or

pretended to favor, both the appointment of Madame de Lorraine and the

marriage project of the Prince. Afterwards, however, and in a manner

which was accounted both sudden and mysterious, it appeared that the

Duchess and Orange had both been deceived, and that the King and Bishop

had decided in favor of another candidate, whose claims had not been

considered, before, very prominent. This was the Duchess Margaret of

Parma, natural daughter of Charles the Fifth. A brief sketch of this

important personage, so far as regards her previous career, is reserved

for the following chapter. For the present it is sufficient to state the

fact of the nomination. In order to afford a full view of Philip's

political arrangements before his final departure from the Netherlands,

we defer until the same chapter, an account of the persons who composed

the boards of council organized to assist the new Regent in the

government. These bodies themselves were three in number: a state and

privy council and one of finance. They were not new institutions, having

been originally established by the Emperor, and were now arranged by his

successor upon the same nominal basis upon which they had before existed.

The finance council, which had superintendence of all matters relating to

the royal domains and to the annual budgets of the government, was

presided over by Baron Berlaymont. The privy council, of which Viglius

was president, was composed of ten or twelve learned doctors, and was

especially 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 superintend

all high affairs of government, war, treaties, foreign intercourse,

internal and interprovincial affairs. The members of this council were

the Bishop of Arras, Viglius, Berlaymont, the Prince of Orange, Count

Egmont, to which number were afterwards added the Seigneur de Glayon, the

Duke of Aerschot, and Count Horn. The last-named nobleman, who was

admiral of the provinces, had, for the present, been appointed to

accompany the King to Spain, there to be specially entrusted with the

administration 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 great

nobles, it had been arranged that the three councils should be entirely

distinct from each other, that the members of the state council should

have no participation in the affairs of the two other bodies; but, on the

other hand, that the finance and privy councillors, as well as the

Knights of the Fleece, should have access to the deliberations of the

state council. In the course of events, however, it soon became evident

that the real power of the government was exclusively in the hands of the

consulta, a committee of three members of the state council, by whose

deliberations the Regent was secretly instructed to be guided on all

important occasions. The three, Viglius, Berlaymont, and Arras, who

composed the secret conclave or cabinet, were in reality but one. The

Bishop of Arras was in all three, and the three together constituted only

the Bishop of Arras.

There was no especial governor or stadholder appointed for the province

of Brabant, where the Regent was to reside and to exercise executive

functions in person. The stadholders for the other provinces were, for

Flanders and Artois, the Count of Egmont; for Holland, Zeeland, and

Utrecht, the Prince of Orange; for Gueldres and Zutfen, the Count of

Meghen; for Friesland, Groningen and Overyssel, Count Aremberg; for

Hainault, Valenciennes and Cambray, the Marquis of Berghen; for Tournay

and Tournaisis, Baron Montigny; for Namur, Baron Berlaymont; for

Luxemburg, Count Mansfeld; for Ryssel, Douay and Orchies, the Baron

Coureires. All these stadholders were commanders-in-chief of the military

forces in their respective provinces. With the single exception of Count

Egmont, in whose province of Flanders the stadholders were excluded from

the administration of justice,--all were likewise supreme judges in the

civil and criminal tribunal. The military force of the Netherlands in

time of peace was small, for the provinces were jealous of the presence

of soldiery. The only standing army which then legally existed in the

Netherlands were the Bandes d'Ordonnance, a body of mounted

gendarmerie--amounting in all to three thousand men--which ranked among

the most accomplished and best disciplined cavalry of Europe. They were

divided into fourteen squadrons, each under the command of a stadholder,

or of a distinguished noble. Besides these troops, however, there still

remained in the provinces a foreign force amounting in the aggregate to

four thousand men. These soldiers were the remainder of those large

bodies which year after year had been quartered upon the Netherlands

during the constant warfare to which they had been exposed. Living upon

the substance of the country, paid out of its treasury, and as offensive

by their licentious and ribald habits of life as were the enemies against

whom they were enrolled, these troops had become an intolerable burthen

to the people. They were now disposed in different garrisons, nominally

to protect the frontier. As a firm peace, however, had now been concluded

between Spain and France, and as there was no pretext for compelling the

provinces to accept this protection, the presence of a foreign soldiery

strengthened a suspicion that they were to be used in the onslaught which

was preparing against the religious freedom and the political privileges

of the country. They were to be the nucleus of a larger army, it was

believed, by which the land was to be reduced to a state of servile

subjection to Spain. A low, constant, but generally unheeded murmur of

dissatisfaction and distrust upon this subject was already perceptible

throughout the Netherlands; a warning presage of the coming storm.

All the provinces were now convoked for the 7th of August (1559), at

Ghent, there to receive the parting communication and farewell of the

King. Previously to this day, however, Philip appeared in person upon

several solemn occasions, to impress upon the country the necessity of

attending to the great subject with which his mind was exclusively

occupied. He came before the great council of Mechlin, in order to

address that body with his own lips upon the necessity of supporting the

edicts 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 be

privately assembled, that he might harangue them upon the same great

topic. In the latter part of July he proceeded to Ghent, where a great

concourse of nobles, citizens, and strangers had already assembled. Here,

in the last week of the month, the twenty-third chapter of the Golden

Fleece was held with much pomp, and with festivities which lasted three

days. The fourteen vacancies which existed were filled with the names of

various distinguished personages. With this last celebration the public

history of Philip the Good's ostentatious and ambitious order of

knighthood was closed. The subsequent nominations were made 'ex indultu

apostolico', 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 retinue

of ambassadors and grandees, made his appearance before them. After the

customary ceremonies had been performed, the Bishop of Arras arose and

delivered, in the name of his sovereign, an elaborate address of

instructions and farewells. In this important harangue, the states were

informed that the King had convened them in order that they might be

informed of his intention of leaving the Netherlands immediately. He

would gladly have remained longer in his beloved provinces, had not

circumstances compelled his departure. His father had come hither for the

good 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 of

five years, which had been broken through by the faithlessness of France.

He had, therefore, been obliged, notwithstanding his anxiety to return to

a country where his presence was so much needed, to remain in the

provinces till he had conducted the new war to a triumphant close. In

doing this he had been solely governed by his intense love for the

Netherlands, and by his regard for their interests. All the money which

he had raised from their coffers had been spent for their protection.

Upon this account his Majesty expressed his confidence that the estates

would pay an earnest attention to the "Request" which had been laid

before 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 to

Spain he hoped to be able to make a remittance. The Duke of Savoy, he

continued, being obliged, in consequence of the fortunate change in his

affairs, to resign the government of the Netherlands, and his own son,

Don Carlos, not yet being sufficiently advanced in years to succeed to

that important post, his Majesty had selected his sister, the Duchess

Margaret of Parma, daughter of the Emperor, as the most proper person for

Regent. As she had been born in the Netherlands, and had always

entertained a profound affection for the provinces, he felt a firm

confidence that she would prove faithful both to their interests and his

own. As at this moment many countries, and particularly the lands in the

immediate 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 perpetual

dissension and misery, to the manifest displeasure of God Almighty; as

his Majesty was desirous to avert such terrible evils from his own

realms, according to his duty to the Lord God, who would demand reckoning

from him hereafter for the well-being of the provinces; as all experience

proved that change of religion ever brought desolation and confusion to

the commonweal; as low persons, beggars and vagabonds, under color of

religion, were accustomed to traverse the land for the purpose of plunder

and disturbance; as his Majesty was most desirous of following in the

footsteps of his lord and father; as it would be well remembered what the

Emperor had said to him upon the memorable occasion of his abdication;

therefore his Majesty had commanded the Regent Margaret of Parma, for the

sake of religion and the glory of God, accurately and exactly to cause to

be enforced the edicts and decrees made by his imperial Majesty, and

renewed by his present Majesty, for the extirpation of all sects and

heresies. All governors, councillors, and others having authority, were

also instructed to do their utmost to accomplish this great end.

The great object of the discourse was thus announced in the most

impressive manner, and with all that conventional rhetoric of which the

Bishop of Arras was considered a consummate master. Not a word was said

on the subject which was nearest the hearts of the Netherlanders--the

withdrawal 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 the

provinces had so long been groaning, was likely to take place; but, on

the contrary, the King had demanded a new levy of considerable amount. A

few well-turned paragraphs were added on the subject of the

administration of justice--"without which the republic was a dead body

without a soul"--in the Bishop's most approved style, and the discourse

concluded with a fervent exhortation to the provinces to trample heresy

and heretics out of existence, and with the hope that the Lord God, in

such case, would bestow upon the Netherlands health and happiness.

After the address had been concluded, the deputies, according to ancient

form, requested permission to adjourn, that the representatives of each

province might deliberate among themselves on the point of granting or

withholding the Request for the three millions. On the following day they

again assembled in the presence of the King, for the purpose of returning

their separate answers to the propositions.

The address first read was that of the Estates of Artois. The chairman of

the deputies from that province read a series of resolutions, drawn up,

says a contemporary, "with that elegance which characterized all the

public acts of the Artesians; bearing witness to the vivacity of their

wits." The deputies spoke of the extreme affection which their province

had always borne to his Majesty and to the Emperor. They had proved it by

the constancy with which they had endured the calamities of war so long,

and they now cheerfully consented to the Request, so far as their

contingent went. They were willing to place at his Majesty's disposal,

not only the remains of their property, but even the last drop of their

blood. 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 of

the province with a smiling face, expressing by the unwonted benignity of

his countenance the satisfaction which he received from these loyal

expressions of affection, and this dutiful compliance with his Request.

The deputy, however, proceeded to an unexpected conclusion, by earnestly

entreating his Majesty, as a compensation for the readiness thus evinced

in the royal service, forthwith to order the departure of all foreign

troops then in the Netherlands. Their presence, it was added, was now

rendered completely superfluous by the ratification of the treaty of

peace so fortunately arranged with all the world.

At this sudden change in the deputy's language, the King, no longer

smiling, threw himself violently upon his chair of state, where he

remained, brooding with a gloomy countenance upon the language which had

been addressed to him. It was evident, said an eye-witness, that he was

deeply offended. He changed color frequently, so that all present "could

remark, from the working of his face, how much his mind was agitated."

The rest of the provinces were even more explicit than the deputies of

Artois. All had voted their contingents to the Request, but all had made

the withdrawal of the troops an express antecedent condition to the

payment 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 throne

that it was very easy to estimate, by these proceedings, the value of the

protestations made by the provinces of their loyalty and affection.

Besides, however, the answers thus addressed by the separate states to

the royal address, a formal remonstrance had also been drawn up in the

name of the States General, and signed by the Prince of Orange, Count

Egmont, and many of the leading patricians of the Netherlands. This

document, which was formally presented to the King before the adjournment

of the assembly, represented the infamous "pillaging, insults, and

disorders" daily exercised by the foreign soldiery; stating that the

burthen had become intolerable, and that the inhabitants of Marienburg,

and of many other large towns and villages had absolutely abandoned their

homes rather than remain any longer exposed to such insolence and

oppression.

The king, already enraged, was furious at the presentation of this

petition. He arose from his seat, and rushed impetuously from the

assembly, demanding of the members as he went, whether he too, as a

Spaniard, was expected immediately to leave the land, and to resign all

authority over it. The Duke of Savoy made use of this last occasion in

which he appeared in public as Regent, violently to rebuke the estates

for the indignity thus offered to their sovereign.

It could not be forgotten, however, by nobles and burghers, who had not

yet been crushed by the long course of oppression which was in store for

them, that there had been a day when Philip's ancestors had been more

humble in their deportment in the face of the provincial authorities. His

great-grandfather, Maximilian, kept in durance by the citizens of Bruges;

his great-grandmother, Mary of Burgundy, with streaming eyes and

dishevelled hair, supplicating in the market-place for the lives of her

treacherous ambassadors, were wont to hold a less imperious language to

the 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 to

dissemble, and to return rather an expostulatory than a peremptory answer

to the remonstrance of the States General. Accordingly a paper of a

singular 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 placing

strangers in the government--a fact which was proved by the appointment

of the Duchess Margaret; that the Spanish infantry was necessary to

protect the land from invasion; that the remnant of foreign troops only

amounted to three or four thousand men, who claimed considerable arrears

of pay, but that the amount due would be forwarded to them immediately

after his Majesty's return to Spain. It was suggested that the troops

would serve as an escort for Don Carlos when he should arrive in the

Netherlands, although the King would have been glad to carry them to

Spain in his fleet, had he known the wishes of the estates in time. He

would, however, pay for their support himself, although they were to act

solely for the good of the provinces. He observed, moreover, that he had

selected two seignors of the provinces, the Prince of Orange and Count

Egmont, to take command of these foreign troops, and he promised

faithfully that, in the course of three or four months at furthest, they

should all be withdrawn.

On the same day in which the estates had assembled at Ghent, Philip had

addressed an elaborate letter to the grand council of Mechlin, the

supreme court of the provinces, and to the various provincial councils

and tribunals of the whole country. The object of the communication was

to give his final orders on the subject of the edicts, and for the

execution of all heretics in the most universal and summary manner. He

gave stringent and unequivocal instructions that these decrees for

burning, strangling, and burying alive, should be fulfilled to the

letter. He ordered all judicial officers and magistrates "to be curious

to enquire on all sides as to the execution of the placards," stating his

intention that "the utmost rigor should be employed without any respect

of persons," and that not only the transgressors should be proceeded

against, but also the judges who should prove remiss in their prosecution

of heretics. He alluded to a false opinion which had gained currency that

the edicts were only intended against anabaptists. Correcting this error,

he stated that they were to be "enforced against all sectaries, without

any distinction or mercy, who might be spotted merely with the errors

introduced by Luther."

The King, notwithstanding the violent scenes in the assembly, took leave

of the estates at another meeting with apparent cordiality. His

dissatisfaction was sufficiently manifest, but it expressed itself

principally against individuals. His displeasure at the course pursued by

the leading nobles, particularly by the Prince of Orange, was already no

secret.

Philip, soon after the adjournment of the assembly, had completed the

preparations for his departure. At Middelburg he was met by the agreeable

intelligence that the Pope had consented to issue a bull for the creation

of the new bishoprics which he desired for the Netherlands.--This

important subject will be resumed in another chapter; for the present we

accompany the King to Flushing, whence the fleet was to set sail for

Spain. He was escorted thither by the Duchess Regent, the Duke of Savoy,

and by many of the most eminent personages of the provinces. Among others

William of Orange was in attendance to witness the final departure of the

King, and to pay him his farewell respects. As Philip was proceeding on

board the ship which was to bear him forever from the Netherlands, his

eyes lighted upon the Prince. His displeasure could no longer be

restrained. With angry face he turned upon him, and bitterly reproached

him for having thwarted all his plans by means of his secret intrigues.

William replied with humility that every thing which had taken place had

been done through the regular and natural movements of the states. Upon

this the King, boiling with rage, seized the Prince by the wrist, and

shaking 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 on

board his Majesty's vessel, but contented himself with wishing Philip,

from the shore, a fortunate journey. It may be doubted, moreover, whether

he would not have made a sudden and compulsory voyage to Spain had he

ventured his person in the ship, and whether, under the circumstances, he

would have been likely to effect as speedy a return. His caution served

him then as it was destined to do on many future occasions, and Philip

left the Netherlands with this parting explosion of hatred against the

man who, as he perhaps instinctively felt, was destined to circumvent his

measures 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, according

to the Antwerp chronicler, set sail upon the 26th August (1559), from

Flushing. The voyage proved tempestuous, so that much of the rich

tapestry and other merchandise which had been accumulated by Charles and

Philip was lost. Some of the vessels foundered; to save others it was

necessary to lighten the cargo, and "to enrobe the roaring waters with

the silks," for which the Netherlands were so famous; so that it was said

that Philip and his father had impoverished the earth only to enrich the

ocean. The fleet had been laden with much valuable property, because the

King had determined to fix for the future the wandering capital of his

dominions in Spain. Philip landed in safety, however, at Laredo, on the

8th September. His escape from imminent peril confirmed him in the great

purpose to which he had consecrated his existence. He believed himself to

have been reserved from shipwreck only because a mighty mission had been

confided to him, and lest his enthusiasm against heresy should languish,

his eyes were soon feasted, upon his arrival in his native country, with

the spectacle of an auto-da fe.

Early in January of this year the King being persuaded that it was

necessary every where to use additional means to check the alarming

spread of Lutheran opinions, had written to the Pope for authority to

increase, if that were possible, the stringency of the Spanish

inquisition. The pontiff, nothing loath, had accordingly issued a bull

directed to the inquisitor general, Valdez, by which he was instructed to

consign to the flames all prisoners whatever, even those who were not

accused of having "relapsed." Great preparations had been made to strike

terror into the hearts of heretics by a series of horrible exhibitions,

in the course of which the numerous victims, many of them persons of high

rank, distinguished learning, and exemplary lives, who had long been

languishing in the dungeons of the holy office, were to be consigned to

the flames. The first auto-da fe had been consummated at Valladolid on

the 21st May (1559), in the absence of the King, of course, but in the

presence 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 of

Seville, followed by the ministers of the inquisition and by the victims,

had arrived in solemn procession at the "cadahalso," where, after the

usual 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 the

crucifix to maintain forever the sacred inquisition and the apostolic

decrees. The Archbishop had then cried aloud, "So may God prosper your

Highnesses and your estates;" after which the men and women who formed

the object of the show had been cast into the flames.--[Cabrera]. It

being afterwards ascertained that the King himself would soon be enabled

to return to Spain, the next festival was reserved as a fitting

celebration for his arrival. Upon the 8th October, accordingly, another

auto-da fe took place at Valladolid. The King, with his sister and his

son, the high officers of state, the foreign ministers, and all the

nobility of the kingdom, were present, together with an immense concourse

of soldiery, clergy, and populace. The sermon was preached by the Bishop

of Cuenga. When it was finished, Inquisitor General Valdez cried with a

loud voice, "Oh God, make speed to help us!" The King then drew his

sword. Valdez, advancing to the platform upon which Philip was seated,

proceeded to read the protestation: "Your Majesty swears by the cross of

the sword, whereon your royal hand reposes, that you will give all

necessary favor to the holy office of the inquisition against heretics,

apostates, and those who favor them, and will denounce and inform against

all those who, to your royal knowledge, shall act or speak against the

faith." The King answered aloud, "I swear it," and signed the paper. The

oath was read to the whole assembly by an officer of the inquisition.

Thirteen distinguished victims were then burned before the monarch's

eyes, besides one body which a friendly death had snatched from the hands

of the holy office, and the effigy of another person who had been

condemned, although not yet tried or even apprehended. Among the

sufferers was Carlos de Sessa, a young noble of distinguished character

and abilities, who said to the King as he passed by the throne to the

stake, "How can you thus look on and permit me to be burned?" Philip then

made the memorable reply, carefully recorded by his historiographer and

panegyrist; "I would carry the wood to burn my own son withal, were he as

wicked as you."

In Seville, immediately afterwards, another auto-da fe was held, in which

fifty living heretics were burned, besides the bones of Doctor

Constantine Ponce de la Fuente, once the friend, chaplain, and almoner of

Philip's father. This learned and distinguished ecclesiastic had been

released from a dreadful dungeon by a fortunate fever. The holy office,

however, not content with punishing his corpse, wreaked also an impotent

and ludicrous malice upon his effigy. A stuffed figure, attired in his

robes and with its arms extended in the attitude which was habitual with

him in prayer, was placed upon the scaffold among the living victims, and

then cast into the flames, that bigotry might enjoy a fantastic triumph

over the grave.

Such were the religious ceremonies with which Philip celebrated his

escape from shipwreck, and his marriage with Isabella of France,

immediately afterwards solemnized. These human victims, chained and

burning at the stake, were the blazing torches which lighted the monarch

to 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.

1559-1560 [CHAPTER I.]

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 the

natural daughter of Charles the Fifth, and his eldest born child. Her

mother, of a respectable family called Van der Genst, in Oudenarde, had

been adopted and brought up by the distinguished house of Hoogstraaten.

Peculiar circumstances, not necessary to relate at length, had palliated

the fault to which Margaret owed her imperial origin, and gave the child

almost a legitimate claim upon its father's protection. The claim was

honorably acknowledged. Margaret was in her infancy placed by the Emperor

in the charge of his paternal aunt, Margaret of Savoy, then Regent of the

provinces. Upon the death of that princess, the child was entrusted to

the care of the Emperor's sister, Mary, Queen Dowager of Hungary, who had

succeeded to the government, and who occupied it until the abdication.

The huntress-queen communicated her tastes to her youthful niece, and

Margaret soon outrivalled her instructress. The ardor with which she

pursued the stag, and the courageous horsemanship which she always

displayed, proved her, too, no degenerate descendant of Mary of Burgundy.

Her education for the distinguished position in which she had somewhat

surreptitiously been placed was at least not neglected in this

particular. When, soon after the memorable sack of Rome, the Pope and the

Emperor had been reconciled, and it had been decided that the Medici

family should be elevated upon the ruins of Florentine liberty,

Margaret's hand was conferred in marriage upon the pontiff's nephew

Alexander. The wretched profligate who was thus selected to mate with the

Emperor's eldest born child and to appropriate the fair demesnes of the

Tuscan republic was nominally the offspring of Lorenzo de Medici by a

Moorish slave, although generally reputed a bastard of the Pope himself.

The nuptials were celebrated with great pomp at Naples, where the Emperor

rode at the tournament in the guise of a Moorish warrior. At Florence

splendid festivities had also been held, which were troubled with omens

believed to be highly unfavorable. It hardly needed, however,

preternatural appearances in heaven or on earth to proclaim the marriage

ill-starred which united a child of twelve years with a worn-out

debauchee of twenty-seven. Fortunately for Margaret, the funereal

portents proved true. Her husband, within the first year of their wedded

life, fell a victim to his own profligacy, and was assassinated by his

kinsman, Lorenzino de Medici. Cosmo, his successor in the tyranny of

Florence, was desirous of succeeding to the hand of Margaret, but the

politic Emperor, thinking that he had already done enough to conciliate

that house, was inclined to bind to his interests the family which now

occupied the papal throne. Margaret was accordingly a few years

afterwards united to Ottavio Farnese, nephew of Paul the Third. It was

still her fate to be unequally matched. Having while still a child been

wedded to a man of more than twice her years, she was now, at the age of

twenty, united to an immature youth of thirteen. She conceived so strong

an aversion to her new husband, that it became impossible for them to

live together in peace. Ottavio accordingly went to the wars, and in 1541

accompanied the Emperor in his memorable expedition to Barbary.

Rumors of disaster by battle and tempest reaching Europe before the

results of the expedition were accurately known, reports that the Emperor

had been lost in a storm, and that the young Ottavio had perished with

him, awakened remorse in the bosom of Margaret. It seemed to her that he

had been driven forth by domestic inclemency to fall a victim to the

elements. When, however, the truth became known, and it was ascertained

that her husband, although still living, was lying dangerously ill in the

charge of the Emperor, the repugnance which had been founded upon his

extreme youth changed to passionate fondness. His absence, and his

faithful military attendance upon her father, caused a revulsion in her

feelings, and awakened her admiration. When Ottavio, now created Duke of

Parma and Piacenza, returned to Rome, he was received by his wife with

open arms. Their union was soon blessed with twins, and but for a certain

imperiousness of disposition which Margaret had inherited from her

father, and which she was too apt to exercise even upon her husband, the

marriage would have been sufficiently fortunate.

Various considerations pointed her out to Philip as a suitable person for

the office of Regent, although there seemed some mystery about the

appointment which demanded explanation. It was thought that her birth

would make her acceptable to the people; but perhaps, the secret reason

with Philip was, that she alone of all other candidates would be amenable

to the control of the churchman in whose hand he intended placing the

real administration of the provinces. Moreover, her husband was very

desirous that the citadel of Piacenza, still garrisoned by Spanish

troops, should be surrendered to him. Philip was disposed to conciliate

the Duke, but unwilling to give up the fortress. He felt that Ottavio

would be flattered by the nomination of his wife to so important an

office, and be not too much dissatisfied at finding himself relieved for

a time from her imperious fondness. Her residence in the Netherlands

would guarantee domestic tranquillity to her husband, and peace in Italy

to 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 his

service.

She was about thirty-seven years of age when she arrived in the

Netherlands, with the reputation of possessing high talents, and a proud

and energetic character. She was an enthusiastic Catholic, and had sat at

the feet of Loyola, who had been her confessor and spiritual guide. She

felt a greater horror for heretics than for any other species of

malefactors, and looked up to her father's bloody edicts as if they had

been special revelations from on high. She was most strenuous in her

observance of Roman rites, and was accustomed to wash the feet of twelve

virgins every holy week, and to endow them in marriage afterwards.--Her

acquirements, 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-Saxons

give a shorter name, but which formed the main substance of statesmanship

at the court of Charles and Philip. In other respects her accomplishments

were but meagre, and she had little acquaintance with any language but

Italian. Her personal appearance, which was masculine, but not without a

certain grand and imperial fascination, harmonized with the opinion

generally entertained of her character. The famous moustache upon her

upper lips was supposed to indicate authority and virility of purpose, an

impression which was confirmed by the circumstance that she was liable to

severe attacks of gout, a disorder usually considered more appropriate to

the sterner sex.

Such were the previous career and public reputation of the Duchess

Margaret. 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 the

Catholic writers described him as a noble of loyal and highly honorable

character. Those of the Protestant party, on the contrary, uniformly

denounced him as greedy, avaricious, and extremely sanguinary. That he

was a brave and devoted soldier, a bitter papist, and an inflexible

adherent to the royal cause, has never been disputed. The Baron himself,

with his four courageous and accomplished sons, were ever in the front

ranks to defend the crown against the nation. It must be confessed,

however, that fanatical loyalty loses most of the romance with which

genius and poetry have so often hallowed the sentiment, when the

"legitimate" prince for whom the sword is drawn is not only an alien in

tongue and blood, but filled with undisguised hatred for the land he

claims to rule.

Viglius van Aytta van Zuichem was a learned Frisian, born, according to

some writers, of "boors' degree, but having no inclination for boorish

work". According to other authorities, which the President himself

favored, he was of noble origin; but, whatever his race, it is certain

that whether gentle or simple, it derived its first and only historical

illustration from his remarkable talents and acquirements. These in early

youth were so great as to acquire the commendation of Erasmus. He had

studied in Louvain, Paris, and Padua, had refused the tutorship Philip

when that prince was still a child, and had afterwards filled a

professorship at Ingolstadt. After rejecting several offers of promotion

from the Emperor, he had at last accepted in 1542 a seat in the council

of Mechlin, of which body he had become president in 1545. He had been

one of the peace commissioners to France in 1558, and was now president

of the privy council, a member of the state council, and of the inner and

secret committee of that board, called the Consults. Much odium was

attached to his name for his share in the composition of the famous edict

of 1550. The rough draught was usually attributed to his pen, but he

complained bitterly, in letters written at this time, of injustice done

him in this respect, and maintained that he had endeavored, without

success, to induce the Emperor to mitigate the severity of the edict. One

does not feel very strongly inclined to accept his excuses, however, when

his general opinions on the subject of religion are remembered. He was

most bigoted in precept and practice. Religious liberty he regarded as

the most detestable and baleful of doctrines; heresy he denounced as the

most unpardonable of crimes.

From no man's mouth flowed more bitter or more elegant commonplaces than

from that of the learned president against those blackest of malefactors,

the men who claimed within their own walls the right to worship God

according to their own consciences. For a common person, not learned in

law or divinity, to enter into his closet, to shut the door, and to pray

to Him who seeth in secret, was, in his opinion, to open wide the gate of

destruction for all the land, and to bring in the Father of Evil at once

to 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, we

shall have hearth gods and tutelar divinities, again, the country will

swarm with a thousand errors and sects, and very few there will be, I

fear, who will allow themselves to be enclosed in the sheepfold of

Christ. I have ever considered this opinion," continued the president,

"the most pernicious of all. They who hold it have a contempt for all

religion, and are neither more nor less than atheists. This vague,

fireside liberty should be by every possible means extirpated; therefore

did Christ institute shepherds to drive his wandering sheep back into the

fold of the true Church; thus only can we guard the lambs against the

ravening wolves, and prevent their being carried away from the flock of

Christ to the flock of Belial. Liberty of religion, or of conscience, as

they call it, ought never to be tolerated."

This was the cant with which Viglius was ever ready to feed not only his

faithful Hopper, but all the world beside. The president was naturally

anxious that the fold of Christ should be entrusted to none but regular

shepherds, for he looked forward to taking one of the most lucrative

crooks into his own hand, when he should retire from his secular career.

It is now necessary to say a few introductory words concerning the man

who, from this time forth, begins to rise upon the history of his country

with daily increasing grandeur and influence. William of Nassau, Prince

of Orange, although still young in years, is already the central

personage about whom the events and the characters of the epoch most

naturally group themselves; destined as he is to become more and more

with each succeeding year the vivifying source of light, strength, and

national life to a whole people.

The Nassau family first emerges into distinct existence in the middle of

the eleventh century. It divides itself almost as soon as known into two

great branches. The elder remained in Germany, ascended the imperial

throne in the thirteenth century in the person of Adolph of Nassau and

gave to the country many electors, bishops, and generals. The younger and

more illustrious branch retained the modest property and petty

sovereignty of Nassau Dillenbourg, but at the same time transplanted

itself to the Netherlands, where it attained at an early period to great

power and large possessions. The ancestors of William, as Dukes of

Gueldres, had begun to exercise sovereignty in the provinces four

centuries before the advent of the house of Burgundy. That overshadowing

family afterwards numbered the Netherland Nassaus among its most stanch

and powerful adherents. Engelbert the Second was distinguished in the

turbulent councils and in the battle-fields of Charles the Bold, and was

afterwards 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 their

father's death, William succeeded to the German estates, became a convert

to Protestantism, and introduced the Reformation into his dominions.

Henry, the eldest son, received the family possessions and titles in

Luxembourg, Brabant, Flanders and Holland, and distinguished himself as

much as his uncle Engelbert, in the service of the Burgundo-Austrian

house. The confidential friend of Charles the Fifth, whose governor he

had been in that Emperor's boyhood, he was ever his most efficient and

reliable adherent. It was he whose influence placed the imperial crown

upon the head of Charles. In 1515 he espoused Claudia de Chalons, sister

of Prince Philibert of Orange, "in order," as he wrote to his father, "to

be obedient to his imperial Majesty, to please the King of France, and

more particularly for the sake of his own honor and profit."

His son Rene de Nassau-Chalons succeeded Philibert. The little

principality of Orange, so pleasantly situated between Provence and

Dauphiny, but in such dangerous proximity to the seat of the "Babylonian

captivity" 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 defended

the little--town of Orange against the assaults of the Saracens. The

interest and authority acquired in the demesnes thus preserved by his

valor became extensive, and in process of time hereditary in his race.

The principality became an absolute and free sovereignty, and had already

descended, in defiance of the Salic law, through the three distinct

families of Orange, Baux, and Chalons.

In 1544, Prince Rene died at the Emperor's feet in the trenches of Saint

Dizier. Having no legitimate children, he left all his titles and estates

to his cousin-german, William of Nassau, son of his father's brother

William, who thus at the age of eleven years became William the Ninth of

Orange. For this child, whom the future was to summon to such high

destinies and such heroic sacrifices, the past and present seemed to have

gathered riches and power together from many sources. He was the

descendant of the Othos, the Engelberts, and the Henries, of the

Netherlands, the representative of the Philiberts and the Renes of

France; the chief of a house, humbler in resources and position in

Germany, but still of high rank, and which had already done good service

to humanity by being among the first to embrace the great principles of

the Reformation.

His father, younger brother of the Emperor's friend Henry, was called

William the Rich. He was, however, only rich in children. Of these he had

five sons and seven daughters by his wife Juliana of Stolberg. She was a

person of most exemplary character and unaffected piety. She instilled

into the minds of all her children the elements of that devotional

sentiment which was her own striking characteristic, and it was destined

that the seed sown early should increase to an abundant harvest. Nothing

can be more tender or more touching than the letters which still exist

from her hand, written to her illustrious sons in hours of anxiety or

anguish, and to the last, recommending to them with as much earnest

simplicity as if they were still little children at her knee, to rely

always in the midst of the trials and dangers which were to beset their

paths through life, upon the great hand of God. Among the mothers of

great men, Juliana of Stolberg deserves a foremost place, and it is no

slight eulogy that she was worthy to have been the mother of William of

Orange and of Lewis, Adolphus, Henry, and John of Nassau.

At the age of eleven years, William having thus unexpectedly succeeded to

such great possessions, was sent from his father's roof to be educated in

Brussels. No destiny seemed to lie before the young prince but an

education at the Emperor's court, to be followed by military adventures,

embassies, viceroyalties, and a life of luxury and magnificence. At a

very early age he came, accordingly, as a page into the Emperor's family.

Charles recognized, with his customary quickness, the remarkable

character of the boy. At fifteen, William was the intimate, almost

confidential friend of the Emperor, who prided himself, above all other

gifts, on his power of reading and of using men. The youth was so

constant an attendant upon his imperial chief that even when interviews

with the highest personages, and upon the gravest affairs, were taking

place, Charles would never suffer him to be considered superfluous or

intrusive. There seemed to be no secrets which the Emperor held too high

for the comprehension or discretion of his page. His perceptive and

reflective faculties, naturally of remarkable keenness and depth, thus

acquired a precocious and extraordinary development. He was brought up

behind the curtain of that great stage where the world's dramas were

daily enacted. The machinery and the masks which produced the grand

delusions of history had no deceptions for him. Carefully to observe

men's actions, and silently to ponder upon their motives, was the

favorite occupation of the Prince during his apprenticeship at court. As

he advanced to man's estate, he was selected by the Emperor for the

highest duties. Charles, whose only merit, so far as the provinces were

concerned, was in having been born in Ghent, and that by an ignoble

accident, was glad to employ this representative of so many great

Netherland houses, in the defence of the land. Before the Prince was

twenty-one he was appointed general-in-chief of the army on the French

frontier, in the absence of the Duke of Savoy. The post was coveted by

many most distinguished soldiers: the Counts of Buren, Bossu, Lalaing,

Aremberg, Meghem, and particularly by Count Egmont; yet Charles showed

his extraordinary confidence in the Prince of Orange, by selecting him

for the station, although he had hardly reached maturity, and was

moreover absent in France. The young Prince acquitted himself of his high

command in a manner which justified his appointment.

It was the Prince's shoulder upon which the Emperor leaned at the

abdication; the Prince's hand which bore the imperial insignia of the

discrowned monarch to Ferdinand, at Augsburg. With these duties his

relations with Charles were ended, and those with Philip begun. He was

with the army during the hostilities which were soon after resumed in

Picardy; he was the secret negotiator of the preliminary arrangement with

France, soon afterwards confirmed by the triumphant treaty of April,

1559. He had conducted these initiatory conferences with the Constable

Montmorency and Marshal de Saint Andre with great sagacity, although

hardly a man in years, and by so doing he had laid Philip under deep

obligations. The King was so inexpressibly anxious for peace that he

would have been capable of conducting a treaty upon almost any terms. He

assured the Prince that "the greatest service he could render him in this

world was to make peace, and that he desired to have it at any price what

ever, so eager was he to return to Spain." To the envoy Suriano, Philip

had held the same language. "Oh, Ambassador," said he, "I wish peace on

any terms, and if the King of France had not sued for it, I would have

begged for it myself."

With such impatience on the part of the sovereign, it certainly

manifested diplomatic abilities of a high character in the Prince, that

the treaty negotiated by him amounted to a capitulation by France. He was

one of the hostages selected by Henry for the due execution of the

treaty, and while in France made that remarkable discovery which was to

color his life. While hunting with the King in the forest of Vincennes,

the Prince and Henry found themselves alone together, and separated from

the rest of the company. The French monarch's mind was full of the great

scheme which had just secretly been formed by Philip and himself, to

extirpate Protestantism by a general extirpation of Protestants. Philip

had been most anxious to conclude the public treaty with France, that he

might be the sooner able to negotiate that secret convention by which he

and his Most Christian Majesty were solemnly to bind themselves to

massacre all the converts to the new religion in France and the

Netherlands. This conspiracy of the two Kings against their subjects was

the matter nearest the hearts of both. The Duke of Alva, a fellow hostage

with William of Orange, was the plenipotentiary to conduct this more

important arrangement. The French monarch, somewhat imprudently imagining

that the Prince was also a party to the plot, opened the whole subject to

him without reserve. He complained of the constantly increasing numbers

of sectaries in his kingdom, and protested that his conscience would

never be easy, nor his state secure until his realm should be delivered

of "that accursed vermin." A civil revolution, under pretext of a

religious reformation, was his constant apprehension, particularly since

so 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 be

master 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 be

discovered and massacred at the most convenient season. For the

furtherance of the scheme in the Netherlands, it was understood that the

Spanish regiments would be exceedingly efficient. The Prince, although

horror-struck and indignant at the royal revelations, held his peace, and

kept his countenance. The King was not aware that, in opening this

delicate negotiation to Alva's colleague and Philip's plenipotentiary, he

had given a warning of inestimable value to the man who had been born to

resist the machinations of Philip and of Alva. William of Orange earned

the surname of "the Silent," from the manner in which he received these

communications of Henry without revealing to the monarch, by word or

look, the enormous blunder which he had committed. His purpose was fixed

from that hour. A few days afterwards he obtained permission to visit the

Netherlands, where he took measures to excite, with all his influence,

the strongest and most general opposition to the continued presence of

the Spanish troops, of which forces, touch against his will, he had been,

in conjunction with Egmont, appointed chief. He already felt, in his own

language, that "an inquisition for the Netherlands had been, resolved

upon more cruel than that of Spain; since it would need but to look

askance at an image to be cast into the flames." Although having as yet

no spark of religious sympathy for the reformers, he could not, he said,

"but feel compassion for so many virtuous men and women thus devoted to

massacre," and he determined to save them if he could!' At the departure

of Philip he had received instructions, both patent and secret, for his

guidance as stadholder of Holland, Friesland, and Utrecht. He was ordered

"most expressly to correct and extirpate the sects reprobated by our Holy

Mother Church; to execute the edicts of his Imperial Majesty, renewed by

the King, with absolute rigor. He was to see that the judges carried out

the edicts, without infraction, alteration, or moderation, since they

were there to enforce, not to make or to discuss the law." In his secret

instructions he was informed that the execution of the edicts was to be

with all rigor, and without any respect of persons. He was also reminded

that, whereas some persons had imagined the severity of the law "to be

only intended against Anabaptists, on the contrary, the edicts were to be

enforced on Lutherans and all other sectaries without distinction."

Moreover, in one of his last interviews with Philip, the King had given

him the names of several "excellent persons suspected of the new

religion," and had commanded him to have them put to death. This,

however, he not only omitted to do, but on the contrary gave them

warning, so that they might effect their escape, "thinking it more

necessary to obey God than man."

William of Orange, at the departure of the King for Spain, was in his

twenty-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 he

had been united when they were both eighteen years of age, was the

daughter of the celebrated general, Count de Buren, and the greatest

heiress in the Netherlands. William had thus been faithful to the family

traditions, and had increased his possessions by a wealthy alliance. He

had two children, Philip and Mary. The marriage had been more amicable

than princely marriages arranged for convenience often prove. The letters

of the Prince to his wife indicate tenderness and contentment. At the

same time he was accused, at a later period, of "having murdered her with

a dagger." The ridiculous tale was not even credited by those who

reported it, but it is worth mentioning, as a proof that no calumny was

too senseless to be invented concerning the man whose character was from

that hour forth to be the mark of slander, and whose whole life was to be

its signal, although often unavailing, refutation.

Yet we are not to regard William of Orange, thus on the threshold of his

great career, by the light diffused from a somewhat later period. In no

historical character more remarkably than in his is the law of constant

development and progress illustrated. At twenty-six he is not the "pater

patriae," the great man struggling upward and onward against a host of

enemies and obstacles almost beyond human strength, and along the dark

and dangerous path leading through conflict, privation, and ceaseless

labor to no repose but death. On the contrary, his foot was hardly on the

first step of that difficult ascent which was to rise before him all his

lifetime. He was still among the primrose paths. He was rich, powerful,

of sovereign rank. He had only the germs within him of what was

thereafter to expand into moral and intellectual greatness. He had small

sympathy for the religious reformation, of which he was to be one of the

most distinguished champions. He was a Catholic, nominally, and in

outward observance. With doctrines he troubled himself but little. He had

given orders to enforce conformity to the ancient Church, not with

bloodshed, yet with comparative strictness, in his principality of

Orange. Beyond the compliance with rites and forms, thought indispensable

in those days to a personage of such high degree, he did not occupy

himself with theology. He was a Catholic, as Egmont and Horn, Berlaymont

and Mansfeld, Montigny and even Brederode, were Catholic. It was only

tanners, dyers and apostate priests who were Protestants at that day in

the Netherlands. His determination to protect a multitude of his harmless

inferiors from horrible deaths did not proceed from sympathy with their

religious sentiments, but merely from a generous and manly detestation of

murder. He carefully averted his mind from sacred matters. If indeed the

seed implanted by his pious parents were really the germ of his future

conversion to Protestantism, it must be confessed that it lay dormant a

long time. But his mind was in other pursuits. He was disposed for an

easy, 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 envoys

were still in the Netherlands, his house, the splendid Nassau palace of

Brussels, was ever open. He entertained for the monarch, who was, or who

imagined himself to be, too poor to discharge his own duties in this

respect, but he entertained at his own expense. This splendid household

was still continued. Twenty-four noblemen and eighteen pages of gentle

birth officiated regularly in his family. His establishment was on so

extensive a scale that upon one day twenty-eight master cooks were

dismissed, for the purpose of diminishing the family expenses, and there

was hardly a princely house in Germany which did not send cooks to learn

their business in so magnificent a kitchen. The reputation of his table

remained undiminished for years. We find at a later period, that Philip,

in the course of one of the nominal reconciliations which took place

several times between the monarch and William of Orange, wrote that, his

head cook being dead, he begged the Prince to "make him a present of his

chief cook, Master Herman, who was understood to be very skilful."

In this hospitable mansion, the feasting continued night and day. From

early morning till noon, the breakfast-tables were spread with wines and

luxurious viands in constant succession, to all comers and at every

moment.--The dinner and supper were daily banquets for a multitude of

guests. The highest nobles were not those alone who were entertained. Men

of lower degree were welcomed with a charming hospitality which made them

feel themselves at their ease. Contemporaries of all parties unite in

eulogizing the winning address and gentle manners of the Prince. "Never,"

says a most bitter Catholic historian, "did an arrogant or indiscreet

word fall from his lips. He, upon no occasion, manifested anger to his

servants, however much they might be in fault, but contented himself with

admonishing them graciously, without menace or insult. He had a gentle

and agreeable tongue, with which he could turn all the gentlemen at court

any way he liked. He was beloved and honored by the whole community." His

manner was graceful, familiar, caressing, and yet dignified. He had the

good breeding which comes from the heart, refined into an inexpressible

charm from his constant intercourse, almost from his cradle, with mankind

of 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 of

the chase, particularly of the knightly sport of falconry. In the country

he "consoled himself by taking every day a heron in the clouds." His

falconers alone cost him annually fifteen hundred florins, after he had

reduced 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 a

race," he wrote carelessly to his brother Louis, "who are somewhat bad

managers in our young days, but when we grow older, we do better, like

our late father: 'sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper et in

secula seculorum'. My greatest difficulty," he adds, "as usual, is on

account of the falconers."

His debts already amounted, according to Granvelle's statement, to

800,000 or 900,000 florins. He had embarrassed himself, not only through

his splendid extravagance, by which all the world about him were made to

partake of his wealth, but by accepting the high offices to which he had

been appointed. When general-in-chief on the frontier, his salary was

three hundred florins monthly; "not enough," as he said, "to pay the

servants in his tent," his necessary expenses being twenty-five hundred

florins, as appears by a letter to his wife. His embassy to carry the

crown to Ferdinand, and his subsequent residence as a hostage for the

treaty in Paris, were also very onerous, and he received no salary;

according to the economical system in this respect pursued by Charles and

Philip. In these two embassies or missions alone, together with the

entertainments offered by him to the court and to foreigners, after the

peace at Brussels, the Prince spent, according to his own estimate,

1,500,000 florins. He was, however, although deeply, not desperately

involved, and had already taken active measures to regulate and reduce

his establishment. His revenues were vast, both in his own right and in

that of his deceased wife. He had large claims upon the royal treasury

for service and expenditure. He had besides ample sums to receive from

the ransoms of the prisoners of St. Quentin and Gravelines, having served

in both campaigns. The amount to be received by individuals from this

source may be estimated from the fact that Count Horn, by no means one of

the most favored in the victorious armies, had received from Leonor

d'Orleans, Due de Loggieville, a ransom of eighty thousand crowns. The

sum due, if payment were enforced, from the prisoners assigned to Egmont,

Orange, and others, must have been very large. Granvelle estimated the

whole amount at two millions; adding, characteristically, "that this kind

of speculation was a practice" which our good old fathers, lovers of

virtue, would not have found laudable. In this the churchman was right,

but he might have added that the "lovers of virtue" would have found it

as little "laudable" for ecclesiastics to dispose of the sacred offices

in their gift, for carpets, tapestry, and annual payments of certain

percentages upon the cure of souls. If the profits respectively gained by

military and clerical speculators in that day should be compared, the

disadvantage 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 had

acquitted himself very creditably of highly important functions at an

early age. Nevertheless it was the opinion of many persons, that he was

of a timid temperament. He was even accused of having manifested an

unseemly panic at Philippeville, and of having only been restrained by

the expostulations of his officers, from abandoning both that fortress

and Charlemont to Admiral Coligny, who had made his appearance in the

neighborhood, merely at the head of a reconnoitring party. If the story

were true, it would be chiefly important as indicating that the Prince of

Orange was one of the many historical characters, originally of an

excitable and even timorous physical organization, whom moral courage and

a strong will have afterwards converted into dauntless heroes. Certain it

is that he was destined to confront open danger in every form, that his

path was to lead through perpetual ambush, yet that his cheerful

confidence and tranquil courage were to become not only unquestionable

but proverbial. It may be safely asserted, however, that the story was an

invention to be classed with those fictions which made him the murderer

of his first wife, a common conspirator against Philip's crown and

person, and a crafty malefactor in general, without a single virtue. It

must be remembered that even the terrible Alva, who lived in harness

almost 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 no

doubt too that caution was a predominant characteristic of the Prince. It

was one of the chief sources of his greatness. At that period, perhaps at

any period, he would have been incapable of such brilliant and dashing

exploits as had made the name of Egmont so famous. It had even become a

proverb, "the counsel of Orange, the execution of Egmont," yet we shall

have occasion to see how far this physical promptness which had been so

felicitous 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. His

enemies never contested the subtlety and breadth of his intellect, his

adroitness and capacity in conducting state affairs, his knowledge of

human nature, and the profoundness of his views. In many respects it must

be confessed that his surname of The Silent, like many similar

appellations, was a misnomer. William of Orange was neither "silent" nor

"taciturn," yet these are the epithets which will be forever associated

with the name of a man who, in private, was the most affable, cheerful,

and delightful of companions, and who on a thousand great public

occasions was to prove himself, both by pen and by speech, the most

eloquent man of his age. His mental accomplishments were considerable: He

had studied history with attention, and he spoke and wrote with facility

Latin, French, German, Flemish, and Spanish.

The man, however, in whose hands the administration of the Netherlands

was in reality placed, was Anthony Perrenot, then Bishop of Arras, soon

to be known by the more celebrated title of Cardinal Granvelle. He was

the chief of the Consults, or secret council of three, by whose

deliberations the Duchess Regent was to be governed. His father, Nicholas

Perrenot, of an obscure family in Burgundy, had been long the favorite

minister and man of business to the Emperor Charles. Anthony, the eldest

of thirteen children, was born in 1517. He was early distinguished for

his talents. He studied at Dole, Padua, Paris, and Louvain. At, the age

of twenty he spoke seven languages with perfect facility, while his

acquaintance with civil and ecclesiastical laws was considered

prodigious. At the age of twenty-three he became a canon of Liege

Cathedral. The necessary eight quarters of gentility produced upon that

occasion have accordingly been displayed by his panegyrists in triumphant

refutation of that theory which gave him a blacksmith for his

grandfather. At the same period, although he had not reached the

requisite age, the rich bishopric of Arras had already been prepared for

him by his father's care. Three years afterwards, in 1543, he

distinguished himself by a most learned and brilliant harangue before the

Council of Trent, by which display he so much charmed the Emperor, that

he created him councillor of state. A few years afterwards he rendered

the unscrupulous Charles still more valuable proofs of devotion and

dexterity by the part he played in the memorable imprisonment of the

Landgrave of Hesse and the Saxon Dukes. He was thereafter constantly

employed in embassies and other offices of trust and profit.

There was no doubt as to his profound and varied learning, nor as to his

natural quickness and dexterity. He was ready witted, smooth and fluent

of tongue, fertile in expedients, courageous, resolute. He thoroughly

understood the art of managing men, particularly his superiors. He knew

how to govern under the appearance of obeying. He possessed exquisite

tact in appreciating the characters of those far above him in rank and

beneath him in intellect. He could accommodate himself with great

readiness to the idiosyncrasies of sovereigns. He was a chameleon to the

hand 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 endowed

with eloquence, readiness, facility. The King ever found himself

anticipated with the most delicate obsequiousness, beheld his struggling

ideas change into winged words without ceasing to be his own. No flattery

could be more adroit. The bishop accommodated himself to the King's

epistolary habits. The silver-tongued and ready debater substituted

protocols for conversation, in deference to a monarch who could not

speak. He corresponded with Philip, with Margaret of Parma, with every

one. He wrote folios to the Duchess when they were in the same palace. He

would write letters forty pages long to the King, and send off another

courier on the same day with two or three additional despatches of

identical date. Such prolixity enchanted the King, whose greediness for

business epistles was insatiable. The painstaking monarch toiled, pen in

hand, after his wonderful minister in vain. Philip was only fit to be the

bishop's clerk; yet he imagined himself to be the directing and governing

power. He scrawled apostilles in the margins to prove that he had read

with attention, and persuaded himself that he suggested when he scarcely

even comprehended. The bishop gave advice and issued instructions when he

seemed to be only receiving them. He was the substance while he affected

to be the shadow. These tactics were comparatively easy and likely to be

triumphant, so long as he had only to deal with inferior intellects like

those of Philip and Margaret. When he should be matched against political

genius and lofty character combined, it was possible that his resources

might not prove so all-sufficient.

His political principles were sharply defined in reality, but smoothed

over by a conventional and decorous benevolence of language, which

deceived vulgar minds. He was a strict absolutist. His deference to

arbitrary power was profound and slavish. God and "the master," as he

always called Philip, he professed to serve with equal humility. "It

seems to me," said he, in a letter of this epoch, "that I shall never be

able to fulfil the obligation of slave which I owe to your majesty, to

whom I am bound by so firm a chain;--at any rate, I shall never fail to

struggle for that end with sincerity."

As a matter of course, he was a firm opponent of the national rights of

the Netherlands, however artfully he disguised the sharp sword of violent

absolutism under a garland of flourishing phraseology. He had strenuously

warned Philip against assembling the States-general before his departure

for the sake of asking them for supplies. He earnestly deprecated

allowing the constitutional authorities any control over the expenditures

of the government, and averred that this practice under the Regent Mary

had been the cause of endless trouble. It may easily be supposed that

other rights were as little to his taste as the claim to vote the

subsidies, a privilege which was in reality indisputable. Men who stood

forth in defence of the provincial constitutions were, in his opinion,

mere demagogues and hypocrites; their only motive being to curry favor

with the populace. Yet these charters were, after all, sufficiently

limited. The natural rights of man were topics which had never been

broached. Man had only natural wrongs. None ventured to doubt that

sovereignty was heaven-born, anointed of God. The rights of the

Netherlands were special, not general; plural, not singular; liberties,

not liberty; "privileges," not maxims. They were practical, not

theoretical; historical, not philosophical. Still, such as they were,

they were facts, acquisitions. They had been purchased by the blood and

toil of brave ancestors; they amounted--however open to criticism upon

broad humanitarian grounds, of which few at that day had ever dreamed--to

a solid, substantial dyke against the arbitrary power which was ever

chafing and fretting to destroy its barriers. No men were more subtle or

more diligent in corroding the foundation of these bulwarks than the

disciples of Granvelle. Yet one would have thought it possible to

tolerate an amount of practical freedom so different from the wild,

social speculations which in later days, have made both tyrants and

reasonable lovers of our race tremble with apprehension. The

Netherlanders claimed, mainly, the right to vote the money which was

demanded in such enormous profusion from their painfully-acquired wealth;

they were also unwilling to be burned alive if they objected to

transubstantiation. Granvelle was most distinctly of an opposite opinion

upon both topics. He strenuously deprecated the interference of the

states with the subsidies, and it was by his advice that the remorseless

edict 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 as

to national and popular rights by representation. For the people

itself--"that vile and mischievous animal called the people"--as he

expressed it, he entertained a cheerful contempt.

His aptitude for managing men was very great; his capacity for affairs

incontestable; but it must be always understood as the capacity for the

affairs of absolutism. He was a clever, scheming politician, an adroit

manager; it remained to be seen whether he had a claim to the character

of a statesman. His industry was enormous. He could write fifty letters a

day with his own hand. He could dictate to half a dozen amanuenses at

once, on as many different subjects, in as many different languages, and

send them all away exhausted.

He was already rich. His income from his see and other livings was

estimated, in 1557, at ten thousand dollars--[1885 approximation. The

decimal point more places to the right would in 2000 not be out of line.

D.W.]--; his property in ready money, "furniture, tapestry, and the

like," at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. When it is considered

that, as compared with our times, these sums represent a revenue of a

hundred 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 good

beginning. Besides his regular income, moreover, he had handsome receipts

from that simony which was reduced to a system, and which gave him a

liberal profit, generally in the shape of an annuity, upon every benefice

which he conferred. He was, however, by no means satisfied. His appetite

was as boundless as the sea; he was still a shameless mendicant of

pecuniary favors and lucrative offices. Already, in 1552, the Emperor had

roundly rebuked his greediness. "As to what you say of getting no

'merced' nor 'ayuda de costa,'" said he, "'tis merced and ayuda de costa

quite 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 of

Saint Armand. Not that he would have accepted this preferment, "could the

abbey 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 of

those new sees, he would willingly have contributed even out of his own

miserable pittance."

It not being considered expedient to confiscate the abbey to any

particular bishop, Philip accordingly presented it to the prelate of

Arras, together with a handsome sum of money in the shape of an "ayuda de

costa" beside. The thrifty bishop, who foresaw the advent of troublous

times in the Netherlands, however, took care in the letters by which he

sent his thanks, to instruct the King to secure the money upon crown

property in Arragon, Naples, and Sicily, as matters in the provinces were

beginning to look very precarious.

Such, at the commencement of the Duchess Margaret's administration, were

the characters and the previous histories of the persons into whose hands

the Netherlands were entrusted. None of them have been prejudged. We have

contented ourselves with stating the facts with regard to all, up to the

period at which we have arrived. Their characters have been sketched, not

according to subsequent developments, but as they appeared at the opening

of this important epoch.

The aspect of the country and its inhabitants offered many sharp

contrasts, and revealed many sources of future trouble.

The aristocracy of the Netherlands was excessively extravagant,

dissipated, and already considerably embarrassed in circumstances. It had

been the policy of the Emperor and of Philip to confer high offices,

civil, military, and diplomatic, upon the leading nobles, by which

enormous expenses were entailed upon them, without any corresponding

salaries. The case of Orange has been already alluded to, and there were

many other nobles less able to afford the expense, who had been indulged

with these ruinous honors. During the war, there had been, however, many

chances of bettering broken fortunes. Victory brought immense prizes to

the leading officers. The ransoms of so many illustrious prisoners as had

graced the triumphs of Saint Quentin and Gravelines had been extremely

profitable. These sources of wealth had now been cut off; yet, on the

departure of the King from the Netherlands, the luxury increased instead

of diminishing, "Instead of one court," said a contemporary, "you would

have said that there were fifty." Nothing could be more sumptuous than

the modes of life in Brussels. The household of Orange has been already

painted. That of Egmont was almost as magnificent. A rivalry in

hospitality and in display began among the highest nobles, and extended

to those less able to maintain themselves in the contest. During the war

there had been the valiant emulation of the battlefield; gentlemen had

vied with each other how best to illustrate an ancient name with deeds of

desperate valor, to repair the fortunes of a ruined house with the spoils

of war. They now sought to surpass each other in splendid extravagance.

It was an eager competition who should build the stateliest palaces, have

the greatest number of noble pages and gentlemen in waiting, the most

gorgeous liveries, the most hospitable tables, the most scientific cooks.

There was, also, much depravity as well as extravagance. The morals of

high society were loose. Gaming was practised to a frightful extent.

Drunkenness was a prevailing characteristic of the higher classes. Even

the Prince of Orange himself, at this period, although never addicted to

habitual excess, was extremely convivial in his tastes, tolerating scenes

and companions, not likely at a later day to find much favor in his

sight. "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 in

such a state that I thought he would certainly die, but he has now got

over it." Count Brederode, soon afterwards to become so conspicuous in

the early scenes of the revolt, was, in truth, most notorious for his

performances in these banqueting scenes. He appeared to have vowed as

uncompromising hostility to cold water as to the inquisition, and always

denounced both with the same fierce and ludicrous vehemence. Their

constant connection with Germany at that period did not improve the

sobriety of the Netherlands' nobles. The aristocracy of that country, as

is well known, were most "potent at potting." "When the German finds

himself sober," said the bitter Badovaro, "he believes himself to be

ill." Gladly, since the peace, they had welcomed the opportunities

afforded for many a deep carouse with their Netherlands cousins. The

approaching marriage of the Prince of Orange with the Saxon princess--an

episode which will soon engage our attention--gave rise to tremendous

orgies. Count Schwartzburg, the Prince's brother-in-law, and one of the

negotiators of the marriage, found many occasions to strengthen the bonds

of harmony between the countries by indulgence of these common tastes. "I

have had many princes and counts at my table," he wrote to Orange, "where

a good deal more was drunk than eaten. The Rhinegrave's brother fell down

dead after drinking too much malvoisie; but we have had him balsamed and

sent home to his family."

These disorders among the higher ranks were in reality so extensive as to

justify the biting remark of the Venetian: "The gentlemen intoxicate

themselves every day," said he, "and the ladies also; but much less than

the men." His remarks as to the morality, in other respects, of both

sexes were equally sweeping, and not more complimentary.

If these were the characteristics of the most distinguished society, it

may be supposed that they were reproduced with more or less intensity

throughout all the more remote but concentric circles of life, as far as

the seductive splendor of the court could radiate. The lesser nobles

emulated the grandees, and vied with each other in splendid

establishments, banquets, masquerades, and equipages. The natural

consequences 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 been

pledged. The more closely ruin stared the victims in the face, the more

heedlessly did they plunge into excesses. "Such were the circumstances,"

moralizes a Catholic writer, "to which, at an earlier period, the affairs

of Catiline, Cethegus, Lentulus, and others of that faction had been

reduced, when they undertook to overthrow the Roman republic." Many of

the nobles being thus embarrassed, and some even desperate, in their

condition, it was thought that they were desirous of creating

disturbances in the commonwealth, that the payment of just debts might be

avoided, that their mortgaged lands might be wrested by main force from

the low-born individuals who had become possessed of them, that, in

particular, the rich abbey lands held by idle priests might be

appropriated to the use of impoverished gentlemen who could turn them to

so much better account. It is quite probable that interested motives such

as these were not entirely inactive among a comparatively small class of

gentlemen. The religious reformation in every land of Europe derived a

portion of its strength from the opportunity it afforded to potentates

and great nobles for helping themselves to Church property. No doubt many

Netherlanders thought that their fortunes might be improved at the

expense of the monks, and for the benefit of religion. Even without

apostasy from the mother Church, they looked with longing eyes on the

wealth of her favored and indolent children. They thought that the King

would do well to carve a round number of handsome military commanderies

out of the abbey lands, whose possessors should be bound to military

service after the ancient manner of fiefs, so that a splendid cavalry,

headed by the gentlemen of the country, should be ever ready to mount and

ride 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. These

circumstances and sentiments had their influence among the causes which

produced the great revolt now impending. Care should be taken, however,

not to exaggerate that influence. It is a prodigious mistake to refer

this great historical event to sources so insufficient as the ambition of

a few great nobles, and the embarrassments of a larger number of needy

gentlemen. The Netherlands revolt was not an aristocratic, but a popular,

although certainly not a democratic movement. It was a great episode--the

longest, the darkest, the bloodiest, the most important episode in the

history of the religious reformation in Europe. The nobles so conspicuous

upon the surface at the outbreak, only drifted before a storm which they

neither caused nor controlled. Even the most powerful and the most

sagacious were tossed to and fro by the surge of great events, which, as

they rolled more and more tumultuously around them, seemed to become both

irresistible and unfathomable.

For the state of the people was very different from the condition of the

aristocracy. The period of martyrdom had lasted long and was to last

loner; but there were symptoms that it might one day be succeeded by a

more active stage of popular disease. The tumults of the Netherlands were

long in ripening; when the final outbreak came it would have been more

philosophical to enquire, not why it had occurred, but how it could have

been so long postponed. During the reign of Charles, the sixteenth

century had been advancing steadily in strength as the once omnipotent

Emperor lapsed into decrepitude. That extraordinary century had not

dawned upon the earth only to increase the strength of absolutism and

superstition. The new world had not been discovered, the ancient world

reconquered, the printing-press perfected, only that the inquisition

might reign undisturbed over the fairest portions of the earth, and

chartered hypocrisy fatten upon its richest lands. It was impossible that

the most energetic and quick-witted people of Europe should not feel

sympathy with the great effort made by Christendom to shake off the

incubus which had so long paralyzed her hands and brain. In the

Netherlands, where the attachment to Rome had never been intense, where

in the old times, the Bishops of Utrecht had been rather Ghibelline than

Guelph, where all the earlier sects of dissenters--Waldenses, Lollards,

Hussites--had found numerous converts and thousands of martyrs, it was

inevitable that there should be a response from the popular heart to the

deeper agitation which now reached to the very core of Christendom. In

those provinces, so industrious and energetic, the disgust was likely to

be most easily awakened for a system under which so many friars battened

in luxury upon the toils of others, contributing nothing to the taxation,

nor to the military defence of the country, exercising no productive

avocation, except their trade in indulgences, and squandering in taverns

and brothels the annual sums derived from their traffic in licences to

commit murder, incest, and every other crime known to humanity.

The people were numerous, industrious, accustomed for centuries to a

state of comparative civil freedom, and to a lively foreign trade, by

which their minds were saved from the stagnation of bigotry. It was

natural that they should begin to generalize, and to pass from the

concrete images presented them in the Flemish monasteries to the abstract

character of Rome itself. The Flemish, above all their other qualities,

were a commercial nation. Commerce was the mother of their freedom, so

far as they had acquired it, in civil matters. It was struggling to give

birth to a larger liberty, to freedom of conscience. The provinces were

situated in the very heart of Europe. The blood of a world-wide traffic

was daily coursing through the thousand arteries of that water-in-woven

territory. There was a mutual exchange between the Netherlands and all

the world; and ideas were as liberally interchanged as goods. Truth was

imported as freely as less precious merchandise. The psalms of Marot were

as current as the drugs of Molucca or the diamonds of Borneo. The

prohibitory measures of a despotic government could not annihilate this

intellectual trade, nor could bigotry devise an effective quarantine to

exclude the religious pest which lurked in every bale of merchandise, and

was wafted on every breeze from East and West.

The edicts of the Emperor had been endured, but not accepted. The

horrible persecution under which so many thousands had sunk had produced

its inevitable result. Fertilized by all this innocent blood, the soil of

the Netherlands became as a watered garden, in which liberty, civil and

religious, was to flourish perennially. The scaffold had its daily

victims, but did not make a single convert. The statistics of these

crimes will perhaps never be accurately adjusted, nor will it be

ascertained whether the famous estimate of Grotius was an exaggerated or

an inadequate calculation. Those who love horrible details may find ample

material. The chronicles contain the lists of these obscure martyrs; but

their names, hardly pronounced in their life-time, sound barbarously in

our ears, and will never ring through the trumpet of fame. Yet they were

men who dared and suffered as much as men can dare and suffer in this

world, and for the noblest cause which can inspire humanity. Fanatics

they certainly were not, if fanaticism consists in show, without

corresponding substance. For them all was terrible reality. The Emperor

and his edicts were realities, the axe, the stake were realities, and the

heroism with which men took each other by the hand and walked into the

flames, or with which women sang a song of triumph while the grave-digger

was shovelling the earth upon their living faces, was a reality also.

Thus, the people of the Netherlands were already pervaded, throughout the

whole extent of the country, with the expanding spirit of religious

reformation. It was inevitable that sooner or later an explosion was to

arrive. They were placed between two great countries, where the new

principles had already taken root. The Lutheranism of Germany and the

Calvinism of France had each its share in producing the Netherland

revolt, but a mistake is perhaps often made in estimating the relative

proportion of these several influences. The Reformation first entered the

provinces, not through the Augsburg, but the Huguenot gate. The fiery

field-preachers from the south of France first inflamed the excitable

hearts of the kindred population of the south-western Netherlands. The

Walloons were the first to rebel against and the first to reconcile

themselves with papal Rome, exactly as their Celtic ancestors, fifteen

centuries earlier, had been foremost in the revolt against imperial Rome,

and precipitate in their submission to her overshadowing power. The

Batavians, slower to be moved but more steadfast, retained the impulse

which they received from the same source which was already agitating

their "Welsh" compatriots. There were already French preachers at

Valenciennes and Tournay, to be followed, as we shall have occasion to

see, by many others. Without undervaluing the influence of the German

Churches, and particularly of the garrison-preaching of the German

military chaplains in the Netherlands, it may be safely asserted that the

early Reformers of the provinces were mainly Huguenots in their belief:

The Dutch Church became, accordingly, not Lutheran, but Calvinistic, and

the founder of the commonwealth hardly ceased to be a nominal Catholic

before 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 in

France, Germany, the Netherlands, England, or Scotland. The policy of

governments, national character, individual interests, and other

collateral circumstances, modified the result; but the great cause was

the same; the source of all the movements was elemental, natural, and

single. The Reformation in Germany had been adjourned for half a century

by the Augsburg religious peace, just concluded. It was held in suspense

in France through the Macchiavellian policy which Catharine de Medici had

just adopted, and was for several years to prosecute, of balancing one

party against the other, so as to neutralize all power but her own. The

great contest was accordingly transferred to the Netherlands, to be

fought out for the rest of the century, while the whole of Christendom

were to look anxiously for the result. From the East and from the West

the clouds rolled away, leaving a comparatively bright and peaceful

atmosphere, only that they might concentrate themselves with portentous

blackness over the devoted soil of the Netherlands. In Germany, the

princes, not the people, had conquered Rome, and to the princes, not the

people, were secured the benefits of the victory--the spoils of churches,

and the right to worship according to conscience. The people had the

right 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 large

mass of the population had acquired the privilege for their own

generation and that of their children to practise that religion which

they actually approved. This was a fact, and a more comfortable one than

the necessity of choosing between what they considered wicked idolatry

and the stake--the only election left to their Netherland brethren. In

France, the accidental splinter from Montgomery's lance had deferred the

Huguenot massacre for a dozen years. During the period in which the Queen

Regent was resolved to play her fast and loose policy, all the

persuasions of Philip and the arts of Alva were powerless to induce her

to carry out the scheme which Henry had revealed to Orange in the forest

of Vincennes. When the crime came at last, it was as blundering as it was

bloody; at once premeditated and accidental; the isolated execution of an

interregal conspiracy, existing for half a generation, yet exploding

without concert; a wholesale massacre, but a piecemeal plot.

The aristocracy and the masses being thus, from a variety of causes, in

this agitated and dangerous condition, what were the measures of the

government?

The edict of 1550 had been re-enacted immediately after Philip's

accession to sovereignty. It is necessary that the reader should be made

acquainted with some of the leading provisions of this famous document,

thus laid down above all the constitutions as the organic law of the

land. A few plain facts, entirely without rhetorical varnish, will prove

more impressive in this case than superfluous declamation. The American

will judge whether the wrongs inflicted by Laud and Charles upon his

Puritan ancestors were the severest which a people has had to undergo,

and whether the Dutch Republic does not track its source to the same

high, 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 writing

made 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 present

at any such in which the adherents of the above-mentioned heretics teach,

baptize, and form conspiracies against the Holy Church and the general

welfare..... Moreover, we forbid," continues the edict, in name of the

sovereign, "all lay persons to converse or dispute concerning the Holy

Scriptures, openly or secretly, especially on any doubtful or difficult

matters, or to read, teach, or expound the Scriptures, unless they have

duly studied theology and been approved by some renowned university.....

or to preach secretly, or openly, or to entertain any of the opinions of

the above-mentioned heretics..... on pain, should anyone be found to have

contravened any of the points above-mentioned, as perturbators of our

state 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 the

man or woman who owned a hymn-book, or who hazarded the opinion in

private, that Luther was not quite wrong in doubting the power of a monk

to sell for money the license to commit murder or incest; or upon the

parent, not being a Roman Catholic doctor of divinity, who should read

Christ'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 by

reprimand, fine, imprisonment, banishment, or by branding on the

forehead, by the cropping of the ears or the slitting of nostrils, as was

practised upon the Puritan fathers of New England for their

nonconformity? It was by a sharper chastisement than any of these

methods. The Puritan fathers of the Dutch Republic had to struggle

against 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 not

persist in their errors; if they do persist in them, then they are to be

executed with fire; all their property in both cases being confiscated to

the crown."

Thus, the clemency of the sovereign permitted the repentant heretic to be

beheaded or buried, alive, instead of being burned.

The edict further provided against all misprision of heresy by making

those who failed to betray the suspected liable to the same punishment as

if suspected or convicted themselves: "we forbid," said the decree, "all

persons to lodge, entertain, furnish with food, fire, or clothing, or

otherwise to favor any one holden or notoriously suspected of being a

heretic; . . . and any one failing to denounce any such we ordain shall

be liable to the above-mentioned punishments."

The edict went on to provide, "that if any person, being not convicted of

heresy or error, but greatly suspected thereof, and therefore condemned

by the spiritual judge to abjure such heresy, or by the secular

magistrate to make public fine and reparation, shall again become

suspected or tainted with heresy--although it should not appear that

he has contravened or violated any one of our abovementioned

commands--nevertheless, we do will and ordain that such person shall be

considered as relapsed, and, as such, be punished with loss of life and

property, without any hope of moderation or mitigation of the

above-mentioned penalties."

Furthermore, it was decreed, that "the spiritual judges, desiring to

proceed against any one for the crime of heresy, shall request any of our

sovereign courts or provincial councils to appoint any one of their

college, or such other adjunct as the council shall select, to preside

over the proceedings to be instituted against the suspected. All who know

of any person tainted with heresy are required to denounce and give them

up to all judges, officers of the bishops, or others having authority on

the premises, on pain of being punished according to the pleasure of the

judge. Likewise, all shall be obliged, who know of any place where such

heretics keep themselves, to declare them to the authorities, on pain of

being held as accomplices, and punished as such heretics themselves would

be if apprehended."

In order to secure the greatest number of arrests by a direct appeal to

the most ignoble, but not the least powerful principle of human nature,

it was ordained "that the informer, in case of conviction, should be

entitled to one half the property of the accused, if not more than one

hundred pounds Flemish; if more, then ten per cent. of all such excess."

Treachery to one's friends was encouraged by the provision, "that if any

man being present at any secret conventicle, shall afterwards come

forward and betray his fellow-members of the congregation, he shall

receive full pardon."

In order that neither the good people of the Netherlands, nor the judges

and inquisitors should delude themselves with the notion that these

fanatic decrees were only intended to inspire terror, not for practical

execution, the sovereign continued to ordain--"to the end that the judges

and officers may have no reason, under pretext that the penalties are too

great and heavy and only devised to terrify delinquents, to punish them

less severely than they deserve--that the culprits be really punished by

the penalties above declared; forbidding all judges to alter or moderate

the penalties in any manner forbidding any one, of whatsoever condition,

to ask of us, or of any one having authority, to grant pardon, or to

present any petition in favor of such heretics, exiles, or fugitives, on

penalty 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, originally

promulgated in 1550 as a recapitulation and condensation of all the

previous ordinances of the Emperor upon religious subjects. By its style

and 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 and

village of the Netherlands. It had been promulgated at Augsburg, where

the Emperor was holding a diet, upon the 25th of September. Its severity

had so appalled the Dowager Queen of Hungary, that she had made a journey

to 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" wherever

that expression had occurred in the original draft.

The edict had been re-enacted by the express advice of the Bishop of

Arras, immediately on the accession of Philip: The prelate knew the value

of the Emperor's name; he may have thought, also, that it would be

difficult to increase the sharpness of the ordinances. "I advised the

King," says Granvelle, in a letter written a few years later, "to make no

change 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 the

phrase, 'Carolus,' etc. I recommended this lest men should calumniate his

Majesty as wishing to introduce novelties in the matter of religion."

This edict, containing the provisions which have been laid before the

reader, was now to be enforced with the utmost rigor; every official

personage, from the stadholders down, having received the most stringent

instructions to that effect, under Philip's own hand. This was the first

gift of Philip and of Granvelle to the Netherlands; of the monarch who

said of himself that he had always, "from the beginning of his

government, followed the path of clemency, according to his natural

disposition, so well known to all the world;" of the prelate who said of

himself, "that he had ever combated the opinion that any thing could be

accomplished by terror, death, and violence."

During the period of the French and Papal war, it has been seen that the

execution of these edicts had been permitted to slacken. It was now

resumed with redoubled fury. Moreover, a new measure had increased the

disaffection and dismay of the people, already sufficiently filled with

apprehension. As an additional security for the supremacy of the ancient

religion, it had been thought desirable that the number of bishops should

be increased. There were but four sees in the Netherlands, those of

Arras, Cambray, Tournay, and Utrecht. That of Utrecht was within the

archiepiscopate of Cologne; the other three were within that of Rheims.

It seemed proper that the prelates of the Netherlands should owe no

extraprovincial allegiance. It was likewise thought that three millions

of souls required more than four spiritual superintendents. At any rate,

whatever might be the interest of the flocks, it was certain that those

broad and fertile pastures would sustain more than the present number of

shepherds. The wealth of the religious houses in the provinces was very

great. The abbey of Afflighem alone had a revenue of fifty thousand

florins, and there were many others scarcely inferior in wealth. But

these institutions were comparatively independent both of King and Pope.

Electing their own superiors from time to time, in nowise desirous of any

change by which their ease might be disturbed and their riches

endangered, the honest friars were not likely to engage in any very

vigorous crusade against heresy, nor for the sake of introducing or

strengthening Spanish institutions, which they knew to be abominated by

the people, to take the risk, of driving all their disciples into revolt

and apostacy. Comforting themselves with an Erasmian philosophy, which

they thought best suited to the times, they were as little likely as the

Sage of Rotterdam himself would have been, to make martyrs of themselves

for the sake of extirpating Calvinism. The abbots and monks were, in

political matters, very much under the influence of the great nobles, in

whose company they occupied the benches of the upper house of the

States-general.

Doctor Francis Sonnius had been sent on a mission to the Pope, for the

purpose of representing the necessity of an increase in the episcopal

force of the Netherlands. Just as the King was taking his departure, the

commissioner arrived, bringing with him the Bull of Paul the Fourth,

dated May 18, 1559. This was afterwards confirmed by that of Pius the

Fourth, in January of the following year. The document stated that "Paul

the Fourth, slave of slaves, wishing to provide for the welfare of the

provinces and the eternal salvation of their inhabitants, had determined

to plant in that fruitful field several new bishoprics. The enemy of

mankind being abroad," said the Bull, "in so many forms at that

particular time, and the Netherlands, then under the sway of that beloved

son of his holiness, Philip the Catholic, being compassed about with

heretic and schismatic nations, it was believed that the eternal welfare

of the land was in great danger. At the period of the original

establishment of Cathedral churches, the provinces had been sparsely

peopled; they had now become filled to overflowing, so that the original

ecclesiastical arrangement did not suffice. The harvest was plentiful,

but the laborers were few."

In consideration of these and other reasons, three archbishoprics were

accordingly appointed. That of Mechlin was to be principal, under which

were constituted six bishoprics, those, namely, of Antwerp, Bois le Due,

Rurmond, Ghent, Bruges and Ypres. That of Cambray was second, with the

four subordinate dioceses of Tournay, Arras, Saint Omer and Namur. The

third 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 the

Bull that "each bishop should appoint nine additional prebendaries, who

were to assist him in the matter of the inquisition throughout his

bishopric, two of whom were themselves to be inquisitors."

To sustain these two great measures, through which Philip hoped once and

forever to extinguish the Netherland heresy, it was considered desirable

that the Spanish troops still remaining in the provinces, should be kept

there indefinitely.

The force was not large, amounting hardly to four thousand men, but they

were unscrupulous, and admirably disciplined. As the entering wedge, by

which a military and ecclesiastical despotism was eventually to be forced

into the very heart of the land, they were invaluable. The moral effect

to be hoped from the regular presence of a Spanish standing army during a

time of peace in the Netherlands could hardly be exaggerated. Philip was

therefore determined to employ every argument and subterfuge to detain

the 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

1560-1561 [CHAPTER II.]

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 and

dismay produced by the causes set forth in the preceding chapter.

Against the arbitrary policy embodied in the edicts, the new bishoprics

and the foreign soldiery, the Netherlanders appealed to their ancient

constitutions. These charters were called "handvests" in the vernacular

Dutch and Flemish, because the sovereign made them fast with his hand. As

already stated, Philip had made them faster than any of the princes of

his house had ever done, so far as oath and signature could accomplish

that purpose, both as hereditary prince in 1549, and as monarch in 1555.

The reasons for the extensive and unconditional manner in which he swore

to 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 most

decisive barrier against the present wholesale tyranny. First and

foremost, the "joyous entry" provided "that the prince of the land should

not elevate the clerical state higher than of old has been customary and

by 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 foreign

resident, civilly or criminally, except in the ordinary and open courts

of justice in the province, where the accused may answer and defend

himself 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 these

privileges, the inhabitants of Brabant, after regular protest entered,

are discharged of their oaths of allegiance, and as free, independent and

unbound people, may conduct themselves exactly as seems to them best."

Such were the leading features, so far as they regarded the points now at

issue, of that famous constitution which was so highly esteemed in the

Netherlands, that mothers came to the province in order to give birth to

their children, who might thus enjoy, as a birthright, the privileges of

Brabant. Yet the charters of the other provinces ought to have been as

effective 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 the

ordinary tribunals and magistrates. The ancient laws and customs shall

remain inviolable. Should the prince infringe any of these provisions, no

one is bound to obey him."

These provisions, from the Brabant and Holland charters, are only cited

as illustrative of the general spirit of the provincial constitutions.

Nearly all the provinces possessed privileges equally ample, duly signed

and sealed. So far as ink and sealing wax could defend a land against

sword and fire, the Netherlands were impregnable against the edicts and

the renewed episcopal inquisition. Unfortunately, all history shows how

feeble are barriers of paper or lambskin, even when hallowed with a

monarch's oath, against the torrent of regal and ecclesiastical

absolutism. It was on the reception in the provinces of the new and

confirmatory Bull concerning the bishoprics, issued in January, 1560,

that the measure became known, and the dissatisfaction manifest. The

discontent was inevitable and universal. The ecclesiastical establishment

which 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 local

courts, distinct for each province, was to be placed, so far as regarded

the most important of human interests, in the hands of bishops and their

creatures, many of them foreigners and most of them monks. The lives and

property of the whole population were to be at the mercy of these utterly

irresponsible conclaves. All classes were outraged. The nobles were

offended because ecclesiastics, perhaps foreign ecclesiastics, were to be

empowered to sit in the provincial estates and to control their

proceedings in place of easy, indolent, ignorant abbots and friars, who

had generally accepted the influence of the great seignors. The priests

were enraged because the religious houses were thus taken out of their

control and confiscated to a bench of bishops, usurping the places of

those superiors who had formally been elected by and among themselves.

The people were alarmed because the monasteries, although not respected

nor popular, were at least charitable and without ambition to exercise

ecclesiastical cruelty; while, on the other hand, by the new episcopal

arrangements, a force of thirty new inquisitors was added to the

apparatus for enforcing orthodoxy already established. The odium of the

measure was placed upon the head of that churchman, already appointed

Archbishop of Mechlin, and soon to be known as Cardinal Granvelle. From

this time forth, this prelate began to be regarded with a daily

increasing aversion. He was looked upon as the incarnation of all the

odious measures which had been devised; as the source of that policy of

absolutism which revealed itself more and more rapidly after the King's

departure from the country. It was for this reason that so much stress

was laid by popular clamor upon the clause prohibiting foreigners from

office. Granvelle was a Burgundian; his father had passed most of his

active life in Spain, while both he and his more distinguished son were

identified in the general mind with Spanish politics. To this prelate,

then, were ascribed the edicts, the new bishoprics, and the continued

presence of the foreign troops. The people were right as regarded the

first accusation. They were mistaken as to the other charges.

The King had not consulted Anthony Perrenot with regard to the creation

of the new bishoprics. The measure, which had been successively

contemplated by Philip "the Good," by Charles the Bold, and by the

Emperor Charles, had now been carried out by Philip the Second, without

the knowledge of the new Archbishop of Mechlin. The King had for once

been able to deceive the astuteness of the prelate, and had concealed

from him the intended arrangement, until the arrival of Sonnius with the

Bulls. Granvelle gave the reasons for this mystery with much simplicity.

"His Majesty knew," he said, "that I should oppose it, as it was more

honorable and lucrative to be one of four than one of eighteen." In fact,

according to his own statement, he lost money by becoming archbishop of

Mechlin, and ceasing to be Bishop of Arras. For these reasons he

declined, more than once, the proffered dignity, and at last only

accepted it from fear of giving offence to the King, and after having

secured compensation for his alleged losses. In the same letter (of 29th

May, 1560) in which he thanked Philip for conferring upon him the rich

abbey of Saint Armand, which he had solicited, in addition to the

"merced" in ready money, concerning the safe investment of which he had

already sent directions, he observed that he was now willing to accept

the archbishopric of Mechlin; notwithstanding the odium attached to the

measure, notwithstanding his feeble powers, and notwithstanding that,

during the life of the Bishop of Tournay, who was then in rude health, he

could only receive three thousand ducats of the revenue, giving up Arras

and gaining nothing in Mechlin; notwithstanding all this, and a thousand

other things besides, he assured his Majesty that, "since the royal

desire was so strong that he should accept, he would consider nothing so

difficult that he would not at least attempt it." Having made up his mind

to take the see and support the new arrangements, he was resolved that

his profits should be as large as possible. We have seen how he had

already been enabled to indemnify himself. We shall find him soon

afterwards importuning the King for the Abbey of Afflighem, the enormous

revenue of which the prelate thought would make another handsome addition

to the rewards of his sacrifices. At the same time, he was most anxious

that the people, and particularly the great nobles, should not ascribe

the new establishment to him, as they persisted in doing. "They say that

the episcopates were devised to gratify my ambition," he wrote to Philip

two years later; "whereas your Majesty knows how steadily I refused the

see of Mechlin, and that I only accepted it in order not to live in

idleness, doing nothing for God and your Majesty." He therefore

instructed Philip, on several occasions, to make it known to the

government of the Regent, to the seignors, and to the country generally,

that the measure had been arranged without his knowledge; that the

Marquis Berghen had known of it first, and that the prelate had, in

truth, been kept in the dark on the subject until the arrival of Sonnius

with the Bulls. The King, always docile to his minister, accordingly

wrote to the Duchess the statements required, in almost the exact

phraseology suggested; taking pains to repeat the declarations on several

occasions, both by letter and by word of mouth, to many influential

persons.

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 to

receive the lion's share of the confiscated abbeys, and that he was

foremost in defending and carrying through the measure, in spite of all

opposition. That opposition waxed daily more bitter, till the Cardinal,

notwithstanding that he characterised the arrangement to the King as "a

holy work," and warmly assured Secretary Perez that he would contribute

his fortune, his blood, and his life, to its success, was yet obliged to

exclaim in the bitterness of his spirit, "Would to God that the erection

of these new sees had never been thought of. Amen! Amen!"

Foremost in resistance was the Prince of Orange. Although a Catholic, he

had no relish for the horrible persecution which had been determined

upon. The new bishoprics he characterized afterwards as parts "of one

grand scheme for establishing the cruel inquisition of Spain; the said

bishops to serve as inquisitors, burners of bodies; and tyrants of

conscience: two prebendaries in each see being actually constituted

inquisitors." For this reason he omitted no remonstrance on the subject

to the Duchess, to Granvelle, and by direct letters to the King. His

efforts were seconded by Egmont, Berghen, and other influential nobles.

Even Berlaymont was at first disposed to side with the opposition, but

upon the argument used by the Duchess, that the bishoprics and prebends

would furnish excellent places for his sons and other members of the

aristocracy, he began warmly to support the measure. Most of the labor,

however, and all the odium, of the business fell upon the Bishop's

shoulders. There was still a large fund of loyalty left in the popular

mind, which not even forty years of the Emperor's dominion had consumed,

and which Philip was destined to draw upon as prodigally as if the

treasure had been inexhaustible. For these reasons it still seemed most

decorous to load all the hatred upon the minister's back, and to retain

the consolatory formula, that Philip was a prince, "clement, benign, and

debonair."

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 at

this juncture to make things pleasant, and he saw no reason why men

should 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 to

suppress the term and retain the thing. "People are afraid to speak of

the new bishoprics," he wrote to Perez, "on account of the clause

providing that of nine canons one shall be inquisitor. Hence people fear