His coadjutors in the Council of State remonstrated with him, bu in vain; a like tax he had imposed on his own little town of Alva, and why should it not be equally feasible in the great commercial cities of the Netherlands? But commerce was better able to protect itself than heresy, and it raised such a storm about the general's ears that he at length seemed very willing to escape from these Flemish citizens; and Philip, who had no other resource than to appoint new men-being utterly incapacitated for the reception of new ideas was equally willing to recall him. The Cardinal seems to have believed, impracticable. or tried to believe, that it was the King's intention to reinstate him after a brief interval. The public, in general, though mystified by this prearranged correspondence, concluded that the Cardinal never would return, and great was their joy at his departure. Even the Duchess was glad to be liberated from a minister who had grown too powerful and domineering. The young nobility were in ecstasies. "Brederode and Count Hoogstraaten were standing together, looking from a window of a house near the gate of Caudenberg, to feast their eyes with the spectacle of their enemy's retreat. As soon as the Cardinal had passed through the gate on his way to Namur, the first stage of his journey, they rushed into the street, got both upon one horse, Hoogstraaten, who alone had boots on his legs, taking the saddle, and Brederode the croup, and galloped after the Cardinal with the exultation of schoolboys." It is time we turn to the opposite and patriot camp. Amongst the brave, jovial, gallant, rich, but thoughtless nobility of Flanders, there was one man of earnest purpose, keen insight, heroic perseverance, whose mind expanded as events developed themselves, who finally devoted himself to the cause of the people of freedom civil and religious-the Prince of Orange. He too, as we first catch sight of him, is the magnificent nobleman, sumptuous, munificent, of generous nature, and a lover of justice, and withal as profoundly versed as Philip himself in what he called the art of government-but not apparently possessed by any great principle of action. As, however, his own life matures, and as the crisis of public affairs approaches, he takes upon himself the full solemnity of the times; he becomes the which is agitating, in a vague and distracting manner, all classes of the community: he devotes himself till death to a great cause. His son is seized, and detained by the court of Spain as a hostage; his vast revenues are spent in the levying of troops to resist the Duke of Alva, and bribes of princely wealth are held out to him; but he is pledged to his work, and sacrifices all, parental affection, and finally life itself, to his great cause. After some interval, the Duke of Alva succeeded to the Cardinal, and those who rejoiced most in the departure of that wily minister might have wished his return; for Alva united in himself all the craft and subtlety that the court of Philip could teach, with a cruelty and hardness of nature seldom learned in camps. But we are not attracted to this man his lineaments are well known, and are not attractive; consummate general as he was, his moral qualities are those we as-worthy leader of that great movement, sociate with a Grand Inquisitor, not a great Captain. And his range of thought must have been very limited; for when he had succeeded in quelling all resistance by his arms, he undid his own work, and kindled against himself the wrath of every citizen, Catholic or Protestant, by the absurdest system of taxation that ever entered into the head of the merest dragoon to establish. Amongst other taxes he imposed, this stands out conspicuous-ten per cent of the value of every article of merchandise to be paid as often as it should be sold. Had he designed to put down commerce as well as heresy, he could not have framed a better system of finance. Imagine every tradesman and merchant, in the thriving cities of Flanders, being compelled to keep an account of every sale they made in the course of the day, in order that they might deduct from their profits this ten per cent to the government. It was monstrous; it was VOL. XLIX.-No. 2 His early education was more adapted to develop his talents than his moral nature, but it was evidently preparing him for the great task he was to accomplish. At an early age he entered as page into the service of Charles V., and the Emperor, recognizing the ability and discretion of his prince-page, (for he had already come into possession of his title and estates,) delighted to have him frequently in his presence, and retained him even when the greatest affairs were discussed 18 with his ministers, or when he gave audiences of the most confidential kind. The youth grew up with a knowledge of men and things that is rarely acquired. At an age when most men are gazing in foolish wonder at the spectacle of courts and governments, he had been introduced behind the scenes, and understood what men were, and what their real motives, and how common a flesh and blood hides beneath the velvet and the ermine. Nor did the Emperor trust his shrewd and silent observer in the cabinet only; he trusted him also in the field. Before the Prince was twenty-one, he was appointed, during the absence of the Duke of Savoy, to be general-in-chief of the army on the French frontier.. After the Emperor's death he was equally trusted by Philip, being employed to negotiate the peace with France. He was one of the hostages selected by Henry of France for the due fulfillment of the treaty. sovereigns of his epoch were capable of forming. As Stadtholder of Holland, Freisland, and Utrecht, it fell upon him to carry out the policy of the Spanish monarch in his treatment of heretics: he received secret instructions to enforce the edicts against all the sectaries without distinction, and with the utmost rigor. From a mere sense of humanity and justice, he was far less severe than Philip required; still he gave orders to enforce conformity with the ancient Church. He was rich, powerful, young; a luxurious and princely life lay before him. His hospitality, like his fortune, was almost regal. "Twenty-four noblemen and eighteen pages of gentle birth officiated regularly in his family." It was a daily banquet in his household, and the generous host of winning manner and address, was beloved and honored by all. It was not at this period of life, that he was disposed to regard the sectaries with any other feeling than that of compassion, mingled probably with some degree of contempt. It was at this period that the incident occurred which is said to have procured him the name of the "Silent." He and Henry, while hunting in the wood of Vin- But, while mingling with all the festivicennes, found themselves together, separ- ties suitable to his age and rank, he eviated from the rest of the company; and dently kept his head clear, and his heart the French King, concluding that the free from any of the malignant passions envoy of Philip was privy to all his de- of the time. All parties trusted him. signs, began to open his mind on the The Protestants looked for justice at his great scheme which he was then secretly hands; the Duchess-regent knew that she framing with his brother of Spain. The had in him a friend to order and good two zealous monarchs were solemnly to government, and had recourse from time pledge themselves for the extirpation of to time to his mediation with the cities heresy in their several kingdoms, and that she had provoked almost beyond endurby the decisive process of massacre of the ance. He endeavored to moderate his heretics, "that accursed vermin." The own party when he saw their proceedings French King proceeded to discuss the assuming an insurrectionary character. details of this most religious plot. The When Brederode, at the head of a nuPrince was silent, and kept his counten- merous procession, presented what was ance; and earned his name of "Silent," called the Request to the Duchess, it was from the manner in which he received the presence of Orange that prevented this blundering confidence of the King. the circumstance from leading to serious The story wears an apocryphal air. The disturbance. It was this Request, as our Prince of Orange was not yet a Protest-readers may remember, that gave rise to ant, and the confidence, therefore, was the famous name of The Beggars, which not so strangely misplaced; and a nickname is not given from a transaction, which at the time is known only to a few persons, for the Prince of Orange would not talk of this. But if Henry of France did make this indiscreet revelation, we may be sure that Orange would not fail to reflect upon it at an after period, when he was engaged in the conflict with Philip. It was a lesson, if he needed one, of what kind of "holy alliance" the Christian the young nobility chose to assume for themselves. The Councilor Berlaymont is reported to have said to the Duchess, pointing to the multitude that accompa nied this petition: "What, madam! is it possible that your highness can entertain fears of these beggars ?" (queux.) At a magnificent repast that took place shortly after, over which Brederode presided, that far too boisterous champion of liberty, repeating the offensive expression of Councilor Berlaymont, exclaimed: "They | is the city quieted because it takes its incall us Beggars! Let us accept the name; toxicating draught of spiritual enthusiasm we will contend with this Inquisition till without the walls. What can the prewe all wear the beggar's sack !" He then sence of one man do, who brings with him beckoned to one of his pages, who brought neither arms to terrify, nor power to rehim a leathern wallet and a large wooden voke the destructive and fanatic measures bowl, such as were worn and used by of the King? Yet the whole city of Antprofessional mendicants, and slinging the werp calls for the Prince of Orange. And wallet round his neck, and filling the the Duchess entreats him to use his medibowl with wine, he lifted the ungainly atorial influence. He goes, and is received goblet with both his hands, and drained as a saviour. Some brief period of peace it at a draught. "Long live the beggars!" follows, but the insane resolution of the (Vivent les gueux !) he cried, as he wiped Spanish monarch can not be shaken. his beard and set down the bowl. "Then," Only through war, and war of the most says Mr. Motley, "for the first time, from terrible kind, can peace finally be secured. the lips of those reckless nobles, rose the famous cry which was so often to ring over land and sea, amid blazing cities, on blood-stained decks, through the smoke and carnage of many a stricken field." Amidst shouts of laughter and applause Brederode threw the wallet round the neck of his nearest neighbor, and handed him the wooden bowl. Each guest in turn took the knapsack, and, pushing aside the gold and silver plate before him, filled the capacious wooden bowl, and drank the beggars! The new shibboleth was invented. While the tumult was at its hight, the Prince of Orange with some other nobles entered the apartment. He was immediately surrounded by the "beggars," these bacchanalian patriots, and compelled to drink their toast, though, in the confusion of the scene, its meaning was still unexplained to him. He drank a cup of wine with them, but used his influence to prevail upon them to break up their dangerous festivities. On every occasion he is seen to be the friend of order and authority, so long as these do not violate the most palpable claims of justice and humanity. It is astonishing how the country began to look upon this man, as if their hope lay with him. Thus it is in disastrous times; if the multitude will, by their fidelity to the greatest amongst them, make him strong, they find a pillar of strength on which they themselves can lean. Antwerp is in a state bordering on insurrection. The preachers of the new faith are forbidden the churches, the chapels, the public rooms, the public streets are driven from the city; the people encamp without the walls, and listen to their preachers there. The sermon, we may be sure, is none the less stirring for being listened to in a half-rebellious spirit; nor Not only between Protestant and Catholic, but between Lutheran and Calvinist, he has to act as mediator. The true principle of toleration seems to be embraced by no one - certainly by no party or sect. He does embrace it, contends for it against friend and foe. At a second visit to Antwerp, it falls on him to prevent a civil war between Lutheran and Calvinist. The storm rages higher, and Orange erects himself to meet it. The pupil of Charles V. knows well what manner of men he has to deal with; no simulation or hypocrisy of the Spanish court can deceive him; to him it is clear as day that there can be no amity with the King except by relinquishing entirely all freedom, civil and religious. He casts in his lot with the people. His friend, Count Egmont, still hoped to combine loyalty with patriotism. Very touching, indeed, is the parting that now takes place between the two friends. Orange in vain tries to open the eyes of Egmont to the true character of the King of Spain. Loyal and generous himself, he can not believe that Philip, who treated him so courteously and hospitably during that visit, so unfortunate for his own fame and honor, which he paid the court at Madrid, means his ruin and destruction. Alva has now come upon the scene. Orange knows well that both he and Egmont are proscribed men. But Egmont is fatally deluded. "Alas! Egmont," said the Prince, "the King's clemency, of which you boast, will destroy you: would that I might be deceived: but I foresee too clearly that you are to be the bridge which the Spaniards will destroy so soon as they have passed over it to invade the country." With these words he conclud ed his vain appeal to awaken the Coun* from his fatal security. "Then, as if persuaded that he was looking upon his friend for the last time, William of Orange threw his arms around Egmont, and held him for a moment in a close embrace. Tears fell from the eyes of both at this parting noment; and then, the brief scene of simple and lofty pathos terminated, Egmont and Orange separated from each other, never to meet again on earth." The "bridge" was very little used; its destruction seemed the main thing that was plotted. Philip wrote to the Count in the most friendly strain after the commission had been given to Alva to arrest him and the other nobles of his party. Thus, in spite of many admonitions-some of them even from Spaniards-the unhappy Count was lured to his destruction. Alva was enabled very dextrously to accomplish his arrest. He had, however, the mortification to find that the man whom above all others it was necessary for him to capture, had escaped. The ex-minister, the Cardinal, on hearing that Orange had not been seized, said very truly: "That Orange had escaped, they had taken nobody, and that his capture would have been more valuable than that of every man in the Netherlands." The contest had now become earnest indeed. It was no longer a weak woman who held the regency; it was the most consummate general and the most inflexible man that Philip could have selected who now held the Netherlands under a military despotism. Orange declared war against this tyrant, levied troops in Germany, expended all his resources to bring an army into the field; but through the masterly generalship and Fabian tactics of Alva, he was doomed to see the season pass, and his troops disband, without effecting any thing. The Prince of Orange gains no victories in the open field. Hardly any great man has accomplished so much with so few successes. But perseverance through adversity, through defeat, through calumny and slander, met with its reward. He trusted always to his sacred cause, and felt that he and it must be under the providence of God. And this is the place to mention that he had now embraced, with a sober and sincere zeal, the Reformed faith; thus arming himself completely for the great task committed to him. We have no account here of the gradual steps of his conversion. Mr. Motley very judiciously observes that the real incidents of his life, and not religious controversy, led, in all probability, to the change. Feeling the necessity for the support of religion, and feeling this need at a time when two forms of Christianity presented themselves for his selection, he preferred the Protestant. A Catholic may suggest that he chose the religion of that party with which his own fortunes were henceforth to be bound up that his was, in fact, a political conversion; but his after life, and the tenor of his private correspondence, prove him to have become sincerely and zealously pious. To us the choice seems very natural: he who had seen so much of priests-though perhaps of the higher and not the more spiritual order-was not likely (if he could adopt another) to select that form of Christianity in which a priesthood stands between the human soul and its God. He would prefer the theology which led him at once into communion with God and Christ, to that which put a priestly confessor beside him to dog his footsteps every moment of his life. One thing is indisputable, and highly to his glory; both for Catholics and Protestants, for Lutherans and Calvinists, he claimed liberty of thought, freedom of worship, the full and manly enunciation of every sincere conviction. He was misunderstood even by his own party; his noble sense of justice was often traduced as lukewarmness and irreligion. Peter Dathenus, a fiery zealot who for some time exerted an overbearing influence from the pulpit of Ghent, denounced him as an atheist in heart a man who knew no God but state expediency, which was the idol of his worship." And a far more temperate Protestant, St. Aldegonde, seemed incapable of comprehending that there was any necessity to preach toleration to those of the Reformed faith; he evidently can not understand that "religious peace" at which the Prince was aiming, that mutual forbearance, that freedom of restraint for all in matters purely religious. "The Prince," he says complainingly, in one of his letters-and the complaint remains an honor to his misapprehended leader-" The Prince has uttered reproaches to me that our clergy are striving to obtain a mastery over cousciences. He praised lately the saying of a monk, who was not long here, that our pot had not gone to the fire as often as that of our antagonists, but that, when the time came, it would be black enough. 66 as In short, the Prince fears that after a few centuries the clerical tyranny on both sides will stand in this respect on the same footing." The Prince of Orange lived to see Holland and Zealand obtain, through many trials and the fiercest struggle, their independence; and had just accepted some modified sovereignty of these provinces, under the title of Count, when his assassination took place. We regret to find how conspicuous a part his old opponent, Cardinal Granvelle, plays in this transaction. It is he, it seems, who whispered into the King's ear the expediency of removing the Prince by the assassination. He couples the advice with a base calumny against the courage of the man whose life was one constant exposure to danger. He was in favor of publicly setting a price upon his head-offering a reward of thirty or forty thousand crowns to any one who would deliver up the Prince dead or alive; and he added, "as the Prince of Orange is a vile coward, fear alone will throw him into confusion." Thus writes, thus counsels, the priest; and the King, who was not difficult to persuade on such an occasion, accordingly published what is called his "ban," in which after enumerating the offenses of Orange, after banishing and putting him out of the pale of law, he continues thus: "And if any one of our subjects, or any stranger, should be found sufficiently generous of heart to rid us of this pest, delivering him to us alive or dead, or taking his life, we will cause to be furnished to him, immediately after the deed shall have been done, the sum of twenty-five thousand crowns in gold. If he have committed any crime, however heinous, we promise to pardon him; and if he be not already noble, we will ennoble him for his valor." Thus, says Mr. Motley, by Cardinal Granvelle and by Philip, a price was set upon the head of the foremost man of his age, as if he had been a savage beast, and admission into the ranks of Spain's haughty nobility was made the additional bribe to tempt the assassin. Balthazar Gérard, the miserable creature who executed this royal ban, had been already led by his fanaticism to believe that the murder of the arch-rebel and arch-heretic, as he thought the Prince, would be a work of supereminent piety. If now, wealth and nobility in this world were to be added to the highest honors in the next, why should he any longer delay to strike? On the one hand there was the imminent risk of being captured after the blow was struck, or the shot fired, and being put to a most cruel death; but, on the other hand, there was a great prize to be gained, and there was every satisfaction that an orthodox Catholic could require for his conscience. His King commanded his confessor approved. When he confided his scheme to the regent of the Jesuit college, "that dignitary expressed high approbation of the plan, gave Gérard his blessing, and promised him that, if his life should be sacrificed in achieving his purpose, he should be enrolled amongst the martyrs." Under a false name and character he contrived to gain admission into the house of the Prince of Orange, who was then residing in the little town of Delft. He represented himself as a Protestant, and the son of a Protestant who had suffered death for his religion. "A pious, psalm-singing, thoroughly Calvinistic youth he seemed to be, having a Bible or a hymn-book under his arm whenever he walked the street, and most exemplary in his attendance at sermon and lecture. For the rest, a singularly unobtrusive personage, twentyseven years of age, low of stature, meager, mean-visaged, muddy-complexioned, and altogether a man of no account." His appearance had so little prepossessed the then Regent of the Netherlands, the Prince of Parma, (who had advanced money to villains of all nations, who had spent it and done nothing,) that he refused to lend him any assistance, and he was absolutely so poor that he received as charity from William of Orange the means of purchasing the pistols by which the assassination was to be committed. With money thus procured, he bought a pair of pistols, or small carabines, from a soldier, chaffering long about the price. On the following day, it is said that the soldier stabbed himself to the heart, and died despairing, on hearing for what purpose the pistols had been bought! The shot was fired as the Prince was passing from the dining-room to his own private apartments. Three balls entered his body. He expired in a few minutes. "O my God! have mercy upon my soul ! O my God! have mercy upon this poor people!" were the last words he uttered. Thus expired a man who may justly be |