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

THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC

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

1855

1564-1565 [CHAPTER V.]

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

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

Philip had exchanged letters of exceeding amity with Orange, Egmont, and
Horn. These three seigniors had written, immediately upon Granvelle's
retreat, to assure the King of their willingness to obey the royal
commands, and to resume their duties at the state council. They had,
however, assured the Duchess that the reappearance of the Cardinal in the
country would be the signal for their instantaneous withdrawal. They
appeared at the council daily, working with the utmost assiduity often
till late into the night. Orange had three great objects in view, by
attaining which the country, in his opinion, might yet be saved, and the
threatened convulsions averted. These were to convoke the states-
general, to moderate or abolish the edicts, and to suppress the council
of finance and the privy council, leaving only the council of state. The
two first of these points, if gained, would, of course, subvert the whole
absolute policy which Philip and Granvelle had enforced; it was,
therefore, hardly probable that any impression would be made upon the
secret determination of the government in these respects. As to the
council of state, the limited powers of that body, under the
administration of the Cardinal, had formed one of the principal
complaints against that minister. The justice and finance councils
were sinks of iniquity. The most barefaced depravity reigned supreme.
A gangrene had spread through the whole government. The public
functionaries were notoriously and outrageously venal. The
administration of justice had been poisoned at the fountain, and the
people were unable to slake their daily thirst at the polluted stream.
There was no law but the law of the longest purse. The highest
dignitaries of Philip's appointment had become the most mercenary
hucksters who ever converted the divine temple of justice into a den of
thieves. Law was an article of merchandise, sold by judges to the
highest bidder. A poor customer could obtain nothing but stripes and
imprisonment, or, if tainted with suspicion of heresy, the fagot or the
sword, but for the rich every thing was attainable. Pardons for the most
atrocious crimes, passports, safe conducts, offices of trust and honor,
were disposed of at auction to the highest bidder. Against all this sea
of corruption did the brave William of Orange set his breast, undaunted
and unflinching. Of all the conspicuous men in the land, he was the only
one whose worst enemy had never hinted through the whole course of his
public career, that his hands had known contamination. His honor was
ever untarnished by even a breath of suspicion. The Cardinal could
accuse him of pecuniary embarrassment, by which a large proportion of
his revenues were necessarily diverted to the liquidation of his debts,
but he could not suggest that the Prince had ever freed himself from
difficulties by plunging his hands into the public treasury, when it
might easily have been opened to him.

It was soon, however, sufficiently obvious that as desperate a struggle
was to be made with the many-headed monster of general corruption as with
the Cardinal by whom it had been so long fed and governed. The Prince
was accused of ambition and intrigue. It was said that he was determined
to concentrate all the powers of government in the state council, which
was thus to become an omnipotent and irresponsible senate, while the King
would be reduced to the condition of a Venetian Doge. It was, of course,
suggested that it was the aim of Orange to govern the new Tribunal of
Ten. No doubt the Prince was ambitious. Birth, wealth, genius, and
virtue could not have been bestowed in such eminent degree on any man
without carrying with them the determination to assert their value.
It was not his wish so much as it was the necessary law of his being
to impress himself upon his age and to rule his fellow-men. But he
practised no arts to arrive at the supremacy which he felt must always
belong to him, what ever might be his nominal position in the political
hierarchy. He was already, although but just turned of thirty years,
vastly changed from the brilliant and careless grandee, as he stood at
the hour of the imperial abdication. He was becoming careworn in face,
thin of figure, sleepless of habit. The wrongs of which he was the daily
witness, the absolutism, the cruelty, the rottenness of the government,
had marked his face with premature furrows. "They say that the Prince is
very sad," wrote Morillon to Granvelle; "and 'tis easy to read as much in
his face. They say he can not sleep." Truly might the monarch have
taken warning that here was a man who was dangerous, and who thought too
much. "Sleekheaded men, and such as slept o' nights," would have been
more eligible functionaries, no doubt, in the royal estimation, but, for
a brief period, the King was content to use, to watch, and to suspect the
man who was one day to be his great and invincible antagonist. He
continued assiduous at the council, and he did his best, by entertaining
nobles and citizens at his hospitable mansion, to cultivate good
relations with large numbers of his countrymen. He soon, however, had
become disgusted with the court. Egmont was more lenient to the foul
practices which prevailed there, and took almost a childish pleasure in
dining at the table of the Duchess, dressed, as were many of the younger
nobles, in short camlet doublet with the wheat-sheaf buttons.

The Prince felt more unwilling to compromise his personal dignity by
countenancing the flagitious proceedings and the contemptible supremacy
of Armenteros, and it was soon very obvious, therefore, that Egmont was a
greater favorite at court than Orange. At the same time the Count was
also diligently cultivating the good graces of the middle and lower
classes in Brussels, shooting with the burghers at the popinjay, calling
every man by his name, and assisting at jovial banquets in town-house or
guild-hall. The Prince, although at times a necessary partaker also in
these popular amusements, could find small cause for rejoicing in the
aspect of affairs. When his business led him to the palace, he was
sometimes forced to wait in the ante-chamber for an hour, while Secretary
Armenteros was engaged in private consultation with Margaret upon the
most important matters of administration. It could not be otherwise than
galling to the pride and offensive to the patriotism of the Prince, to
find great public transactions entrusted to such hands. Thomas de
Armenteros was a mere private secretary--a simple clerk. He had no right
to have cognizance of important affairs, which could only come before his
Majesty's sworn advisers. He was moreover an infamous peculator. He was
rolling up a fortune with great rapidity by his shameless traffic in
benefices, charges, offices, whether of church or state. His name of
Armenteros was popularly converted into Argenteros, in order to symbolize
the man who was made of public money. His confidential intimacy with the
Duchess procured for him also the name of "Madam's barber," in allusion
to the famous ornaments of Margaret's upper lip, and to the celebrated
influence enjoyed by the barbers of the Duke of Savoy, and of Louis the
Eleventh. This man sold dignities and places of high responsibility at
public auction. The Regent not only connived at these proceedings, which
would have been base enough, but she was full partner in the disgraceful
commerce. Through the agency of the Secretary, she, too, was amassing a
large private fortune. "The Duchess has gone into the business of
vending places to the highest bidders," said Morillon, "with the bit
between her teeth." The spectacle presented at the council-board was
often sufficiently repulsive not only to the cardinalists, who were
treated with elaborate insolence, but to all men who loved honor and
justice, or who felt an interest in the prosperity of government. There
was nothing majestic in the appearance of the Duchess, as she sat
conversing apart with Armenteros, whispering, pinching, giggling, or
disputing, while important affairs of state were debated, concerning
which the Secretary had no right to be informed. It was inevitable that
Orange should be offended to the utmost by such proceedings, although he
was himself treated with comparative respect. As for the ancient
adherents of Granvelle, the Bordeys, Baves, and Morillons, they were
forbidden by the favorite even to salute him in the streets. Berlaymont
was treated by the Duchess with studied insult. "What is the man talking
about?" she would ask with languid superciliousness, if he attempted to
express his opinion in the state-council. Viglius, whom Berlaymont
accused of doing his best, without success, to make his peace with the
seigniors, was in even still greater disgrace than his fellow-
cardinalists. He longed, he said, to be in Burgundy, drinking
Granvelle's good wine. His patience under the daily insults which he
received from the government made him despicable in the eyes of his own
party. He was described by his friends as pusillanimous to an incredible
extent, timid from excess of riches, afraid of his own shadow. He was
becoming exceedingly pathetic, expressing frequently a desire to depart
and end his days in peace. His faithful Hopper sustained and consoled
him, but even Joachim could not soothe his sorrows when he reflected that
after all the work performed by himself and colleagues, "they had only
been beating the bush for others," while their own share in the spoils
had been withheld. Nothing could well be more contumelious than
Margaret's treatment of the learned Frisian. When other councillors were
summoned to a session at three o'clock, the President was invited at
four. It was quite impossible for him to have an audience of the Duchess
except in the presence of the inevitable Armenteras. He was not allowed
to open his mouth, even when he occasionally plucked up heart enough to
attempt the utterance of his opinions. His authority was completely
dead. Even if he essayed to combat the convocation of the states-general
by the arguments which the Duchess, at his suggestion, had often used for
the purpose, he was treated with the same indifference. "The poor
President," wrote Granvelle to the King's chief secretary, Gonzalo Perez,
"is afraid, as I hear, to speak a word, and is made to write exactly what
they tell him." At the same time the poor President, thus maltreated and
mortified, had the vanity occasionally to imagine himself a bold and
formidable personage. The man whom his most intimate friends described
as afraid of his own shadow, described himself to Granvelle as one who
went his own gait, speaking his mind frankly upon every opportunity, and
compelling people to fear him a little, even if they did not love him.
But the Cardinal knew better than to believe in this magnanimous picture
of the doctor's fancy.

Viglius was anxious to retire, but unwilling to have the appearance of
being disgraced. He felt instinctively, although deceived as to the
actual facts, that his great patron had been defeated and banished.
He did not wish to be placed in the same position. He was desirous,
as he piously expressed himself, of withdrawing from the world, "that he
might balance his accounts with the Lord, before leaving the lodgings of
life." He was, however, disposed to please "the master" as well as the
Lord. He wished to have the royal permission to depart in peace.
In his own lofty language, he wished to be sprinkled on taking his leave
"with the holy water of the court." Moreover, he was fond of his salary,
although he disliked the sarcasms of the Duchess. Egmont and others had
advised him to abandon the office of President to Hopper, in order, as he
was getting feeble, to reserve his whole strength for the state-council.
Viglius did not at all relish the proposition. He said that by giving
up the seals, and with them the rank and salary which they conferred,
he should become a deposed saint. He had no inclination, as long as he
remained on the ground at all, to part with those emoluments and honors,
and to be converted merely into the "ass of the state-council." He had,
however, with the sagacity of an old navigator, already thrown out his
anchor into the best holding-ground during the storms which he foresaw
were soon to sweep the state. Before the close of the year which now
occupies, the learned doctor of laws had become a doctor of divinity
also; and had already secured, by so doing, the wealthy prebend of Saint
Bavon of Ghent. This would be a consolation in the loss of secular
dignities, and a recompence for the cold looks of the Duchess. He did
not scruple to ascribe the pointed dislike which Margaret manifested
towards him to the awe in which she stood of his stern integrity of
character. The true reason why Armenteros and the Duchess disliked him
was because, in his own words, "he was not of their mind with regard to
lotteries, the sale of offices, advancement to abbeys, and many other
things of the kind, by which they were in such a hurry to make their
fortune." Upon another occasion he observed, in a letter to Granvelle,
that "all offices were sold to the highest bidder, and that the cause of
Margaret's resentment against both the Cardinal and himself was, that
they had so long prevented her from making the profit which she was now
doing from the sale of benefices, offices, and other favors."

The Duchess, on her part, characterized the proceedings and policy, both
past and present, of the cardinalists as factious, corrupt, and selfish
in the last degree. She assured her brother that the simony, rapine, and
dishonesty of Granvelle, Viglius, and all their followers, had brought
affairs into the ruinous condition which was then but too apparent. They
were doing their best, she said, since the Cardinal's departure, to show,
by their sloth and opposition, that they were determined to allow nothing
to prosper in his absence. To quote her own vigorous expression to
Philip--"Viglius made her suffer the pains of hell." She described him
as perpetually resisting the course of the administration, and she threw
out dark suspicions, not only as to his honesty but his orthodoxy.
Philip lent a greedy ear to these scandalous hints concerning the late
omnipotent minister and his friends. It is an instructive lesson in
human history to look through the cloud of dissimulation in which the
actors of this remarkable epoch were ever enveloped, and to watch them
all stabbing fiercely at each other in the dark, with no regard to
previous friendship, or even present professions. It is edifying to see
the Cardinal, with all his genius and all his grimace, corresponding on
familiar terms with Armenteros, who was holding him up to obloquy upon
all occasions; to see Philip inclining his ear in pleased astonishment to
Margaret's disclosures concerning the Cardinal, whom he was at the very
instant assuring of his undiminished confidence; and to see Viglius, the
author of the edict of 1550, and the uniform opponent of any mitigation
in its horrors, silently becoming involved without the least suspicion of
the fact in the meshes of inquisitor Titelmann.

Upon Philip's eager solicitations for further disclosures, Margaret
accordingly informed her brother of additional facts communicated to her,
after oaths of secrecy had been exchanged, by Titelmann and his colleague
del Canto. They had assured her, she said, that there were grave doubts
touching the orthodoxy of Viglius. He had consorted with heretics during
a large portion of his life, and had put many suspicious persons into
office. As to his nepotism, simony, and fraud, there was no doubt at
all. He had richly provided all his friends and relations in Friesland
with benefices. He had become in his old age a priest and churchman, in
order to snatch the provostship of Saint Bavon, although his infirmities
did not allow him to say mass, or even to stand erect at the altar.
The inquisitors had further accused him of having stolen rings, jewels,
plate, linen, beds, tapestry, and other furniture, from the
establishment, all which property he had sent to Friesland, and of having
seized one hundred thousand florins in ready money which had belonged to
the last abbe--an act consequently of pure embezzlement. The Duchess
afterwards transmitted to Philip an inventory of the plundered property,
including the furniture of nine houses, and begged him to command Viglius
to make instant restitution. If there be truth in the homely proverb,
that in case of certain quarrels honest men recover their rights, it is
perhaps equally certain that when distinguished public personages attack
each other, historians may arrive at the truth. Here certainly are
edifying pictures of the corruption of the Spanish regency in the
Netherlands, painted by the President of the state-council, and of the
dishonesty of the President painted by the Regent.

A remarkable tumult occurred in October of this year, at Antwerp. A
Carmelite monk, Christopher Smith, commonly called Fabricius, had left a
monastery in Bruges, adopted the principles of the Reformation, and taken
to himself a wife. He had resided for a time in England; but, invited by
his friends, he had afterwards undertaken the dangerous charge of gospel-
teacher in the commercial metropolis of the Netherlands. He was,
however, soon betrayed to the authorities by a certain bonnet dealer,
popularly called Long Margaret, who had pretended, for the sake of
securing the informer's fee, to be a convert to his doctrines. He was
seized, and immediately put to the torture. He manfully refused to
betray any members of his congregation, as manfully avowed and maintained
his religious creed. He was condemned to the flames, and during the
interval which preceded his execution, he comforted his friends by
letters of advice, religious consolation and encouragement, which he
wrote from his dungeon. He sent a message to the woman who had betrayed
him, assuring her of his forgiveness, and exhorting her to repentance.
His calmness, wisdom, and gentleness excited the admiration of all.
When; therefore, this humble imitator of Christ was led through the
streets of Antwerp to the stake, the popular emotion was at once visible.
To the multitude who thronged about the executioners with threatening
aspect, he addressed an urgent remonstrance that they would not
compromise their own safety by a tumult in his cause. He invited all,
however, to remain steadfast to the great truth for which he was about to
lay down his life. The crowd, as they followed the procession of
hangmen, halberdsmen, and magistrates, sang the hundred and thirtieth
psalm in full chorus. As the victim arrived upon the market-place,
he knelt upon the ground to pray, for the last time. He was, however,
rudely forced to rise by the executioner, who immediately chained him to
the stake, and fastened a leathern strap around his throat. At this
moment the popular indignation became uncontrollable; stones were
showered upon the magistrates and soldiers, who, after a slight
resistance, fled for their lives. The foremost of the insurgents dashed
into the enclosed arena, to rescue the prisoner. It was too late. The
executioner, even as he fled, had crushed the victim's head with a sledge
hammer, and pierced him through and through with a poniard. Some of the
bystanders maintained afterwards that his fingers and lips were seen to
move, as if in feeble prayer, for a little time longer, until, as the
fire mounted, he fell into the flames. For the remainder of the day,
after the fire had entirely smouldered to ashes, the charred and half-
consumed body of the victim remained on the market-place, a ghastly
spectacle to friend and foe. It was afterwards bound to a stone and cast
into the Scheld. Such was the doom of Christopher Fabricius, for having
preached Christianity in Antwerp. During the night an anonymous placard,
written with blood, was posted upon the wall of the town-house, stating
that there were men in the city who would signally avenge his murder.
Nothing was done, however, towards the accomplishment of the threat.
The King, when he received the intelligence of the transaction, was
furious with indignation, and wrote savage letters to his sister,
commanding instant vengeance to be taken upon all concerned in so foul
a riot. As one of the persons engaged had, however, been arrested and
immediately hanged, and as the rest had effected their escape, the affair
was suffered to drop.

The scenes of outrage, the frantic persecutions, were fast becoming too
horrible to be looked upon by Catholic or Calvinist. The prisons swarmed
with victims, the streets were thronged with processions to the stake.
The population of thriving cities, particularly in Flanders, were
maddened by the spectacle of so much barbarity inflicted, not upon
criminals, but usually upon men remarkable for propriety of conduct and
blameless lives. It was precisely at this epoch that the burgomasters,
senators, and council of the city of Bruges (all Catholics) humbly
represented to the Duchess Regent, that Peter Titelmann, inquisitor of
the Faith, against all forms of law, was daily exercising inquisition
among the inhabitants, not only against those suspected or accused of
heresy, but against all, however untainted their characters; that he was
daily citing before him whatever persons he liked, men or women,
compelling them by force to say whatever it pleased him; that he was
dragging people from their houses, and even from the sacred precincts of
the church; often in revenge for verbal injuries to himself, always under
pretext of heresy, and without form or legal warrant of any kind. They
therefore begged that he might be compelled to make use of preparatory
examinations with the co-operation of the senators of the city, to suffer
that witnesses should make their depositions without being intimidated by
menace, and to conduct all his subsequent proceedings according to legal
forms, which he had uniformly violated; publicly declaring that he would
conduct himself according to his own pleasure.

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