CHAP. VIII.]

THE EDICT OF NEMOURS.

297

taken part in the civil wars of France, into which he was enticed by the promise of Toul and Verdun. The King's answer to the manifesto of the League resembled that of an arraigned criminal. He despatched his mother to Epernay, to negociate with the Guises; who, however, as a considerable part of the kingdom had declared for the League, rose in their demands in proportion to their success. The negociations were transferred from Epernay to Nemours; and though the King's arms had met with some partial success, a treaty was concluded in July which amounted to a virtual surrender of the royal authority as well as a complete prohibition of the Protestant faith. All former edicts in favour of the Protestants were revoked; the Chambres mi-parties were abolished; the reformed ministers were to quit the kingdom within a month, and all other obstinate heretics within six months. The Dukes of Guise, Mayenne, Elbeuf, Aumale, Mercœur, were not only to retain their governments, but nine cautionary towns were also to be assigned to them and to the Cardinal of Bourbon for five years; viz. Soissons, Dinon, Le Conquet, Châlons, Verdun, Toul, St. Dizier, Beaune, and Rue. This peace was proclaimed July 7th, by the EDICT OF NEMOURS.29 On the 13th the King joined his mother at St. Maur, where he received the homage of the Cardinals of Bourbon and Guise, and of the Dukes of Lorraine and Guise. On the 18th he went in person to the Parliament of Paris to publish the revocation of all former edicts of toleration, and the suppression of the (pretended) reformed · religion.

Having thus brought down the history of the Protestant struggle in France to a period when the reformed faith seemed threatened with extinction, we will now turn our attention to the Netherlands, where, at this time, it was menaced with a similar fate.

The Edict is in Mém. de la Ligue, t. i. p. 178 sqq. (ed. Amst. 1758).

298

THE UNION OF BRUSSELS.

[BOOK III.

CHAPTER IX.

THE history of the revolt in the Netherlands has been carried down in a former chapter to the pacification of Ghent, November 8th 1576. It was a mistake on the part of Philip II. to leave the country eight months with only an ad interim government. Had he immediately filled up the vacancy occasioned by the death of Requesens, either by the appointment of his sister Margaret, or any other person, the States could not have seized upon the government, and the alliance established at Ghent would not have been effected, by which an almost independent commonwealth had been erected. But Philip seems to have been puzzled as to the choice of a successor; and his selection, at length, of his brother Don John of Austria, caused a further considerable delay. Don John, the hero of Lepanto, was, at that time, governor of the Milanese, where necessary arrangements compelled him to remain some time after his appointment. He then proceeded to Spain for instructions, whence he travelled in the greatest haste through France.

The state of the Netherlands compelled Don John to enter them not with the pomp and dignity becoming the lawful representative of a great monarch, but stealthily, like a traitor or conspirator. In Luxemburg alone, the only province which had not joined the union, could he expect to be received; and he entered its capital a few days before the publication of the treaty of Ghent, in the disguise of a Moorish slave, and in the train of Don Ottavio Gonzaga, brother of the Prince of Melfi. Having neither money nor arms, he was obliged to negociate with the provincial government in order to procure the recognition of his authority. At the instance of the Prince of Orange, the States insisted on the withdrawal of the Spanish troops, the maintenance of the treaty of Ghent, an act of amnesty for past offences, the convocation of the StatesGeneral, and an oath from Don John that he would respect all the charters and customs of the country. The new governor was violent, but the States were firm, and in January 1577 was formed the UNION OF BRUSSELS, the professed objects of which were, the immediate expulsion of the Spaniards, and the execution of the Pacification of Ghent; while at the same time the Catholic religion

CHAP. IX.]

THE PERPETUAL EDICT.

299

and the royal authority were to be upheld. This union, which was only a more popular repetition of the treaty of Ghent, soon obtained numberless signatures; while the treaty had been signed only by the envoys of the Prince of Orange and the States of Holland and Zealand on the one side, and those of a certain number of the Provinces on the other. The Union of Brussels, by the stipulation in favour of Catholicism, contained in it the seeds of its own dissolution; but it became the stepping-stone to the more important Union of Utrecht.

Meanwhile Rodolph II. the new Emperor of Germany, had offered his mediation, and appointed the Bishop of Liége to use his good offices between the parties; who, with the assistance of Duke William of Juliers brought, or seemed to bring, the new governor to a more reasonable frame of mind. Don John, however, was perhaps in reality determined by instructions brought to him from Spain by his secretary Escovedo, recommending no doubt that duplicity which characterised the policy of the Spanish Court. However this may be, when the negociations were resumed at Marche en Famine, Don John yielded all the points in dispute, and embodied them in what was called the PERPETUAL EDICT, published March 12th 1577. The Prince of Orange suspected from the first that these concessions were a mere deception, to be violated on the first opportunity; and his suspicions of the governor's hypocrisy were afterwards confirmed by intercepted letters. Although, to the astonishment of those not in the secret, the Perpetual Edict was confirmed by Philip (April 7th 1577), the Prince of Orange refused to publish it in Holland and Zealand. To his secret motives we have alluded; his public objections to the Edict were, among others, that no definite time had been fixed for the assembling of the States-General; that the ratification of the treaty of Ghent was not categorical; that the States were called upon to pay the foreign mercenaries who had oppressed them; that his son, Count Buren, was still detained a prisoner, &c. Don John endeavoured to gain over the Prince by private negociations, in which magnificent offers were made to him; but William was incorruptible.

The Perpetual Edict did not produce any immediate separation between the northern and southern provinces. Although the Spanish troops were actually sent away in April, the Catholics as well as Protestants still harboured suspicions of the Spaniards; and when Don John entered Brussels, May 1st 1577, the citizens refused to give him possession of the citadel. Finding himself thus a governor merely in name, and without any real authority, he

300

POPULARITY OF WILLIAM OF NASSAU.

[BOOK III. resolved to throw off the mask, and to seize by stealth the power that was withheld from him. On pretence of paying a visit to the consort of Henry of Navarre, who was on her way to the baths of Spa, Don John repaired to Namur, where the citadel was commanded by two sons of Count Barlaimont, who were favourable to his views, and who gave him possession of that fortress. He soon after got possession of Charlemont and Marienberg, but failed in an attempt upon the citadel of Antwerp. These steps he excused on the ground that they were necessary to his security, pretending that a conspiracy had been formed to take his life.

The Prince of Orange endeavoured to prevail on the States to resent these encroachments, and to attack Don John with all their force; but this seemed too bold a step to the aristocratic and Catholic party, led by the Duke of Aerschot. The exertions of William were thus confined to his own provinces of Holland and Zealand, where a college of eighteen persons was appointed to promote the popular cause. Permission was obtained from the Catholic States for deputies from Holland and Zealand to enter the Brussels assembly, where they often gave the tone; and they even succeeded in effecting an alliance between the States and the Elector Palatine, a Prince much dreaded by the Catholic party. When the negociations were resumed with Don John, the States demanded that the citadels of Ghent and Antwerp should be razed; but the republican party in those cities made them level with the ground, without waiting for his answer.

On the 23rd of September 1577, the Prince of Orange, at the invitation of the States-General, entered Brussels amid great rejoicings and the acclamations of the people, who hailed him as "Father William." During his absence prayers were daily offered up for his safety in the churches of Holland and Zealand. The prince immediately stopped all negociations with Don John, who was at Namur; and prescribed to him conditions so stringent, that the governor regarded them as a declaration of war, and retired to Luxemburg. Aerschot and the Catholic nobility were averse to these proceedings, though they were unable to hinder them. When they acceded to the Pacification of Ghent, they had hoped to obtain the leading influence in the government; they now saw with jealousy the chief power in the hands of Orange and his party, yet at the same time they hated and suspected the Spaniards. On the other hand William became the favourite of the people. The Brabanters elected him their Ruward, a dignity generally reserved for the heir to the sovereignty, and which conferred upon him an almost dictatorial power. He had also been offered the Stad

CHAP. IX.]

THE STATES DEPOSE DON JOHN.

301

holdership of Flanders, which however he declined. These marks of popular favour were bestowed upon Orange partly in consequence of a step taken by his opponents. The Catholic aristocrats, who disliked both Don John and the Prince of Orange, had called in as their governor the Archduke Matthias, a youth of twenty years of age, brother of the Emperor Rodolph II. Matthias accepted the invitation, and came to Brussels without consulting his brother; but he had no talent, and was never anything more than a puppet in the hands of contending factions. To avoid useless contention, as well as not to give offence to the Germans, Orange accepted the nomination of Matthias, and received him with honour. On the 7th December 1577, the States-General formally deposed Don John, and declared all who should assist him rebels and traitors; and on the 10th a fresh "Union of Brussels" was signed, by which Protestantism was placed on a more favourable footing than by the Pacification of Ghent. This, however, was the last time that the Netherlands were united, nor did their union prove of long duration. Matthias was inaugurated at Antwerp as Governor-General, January 18th 1578, having first subscribed a constitution drawn up under the superintendence of the Prince of Orange. William was to be his Lieutenant-General; a step insisted on by Queen Elizabeth, who had now begun to afford the Netherlanders some substantial assistance. Her motives were somewhat selfish. She had discovered that Don John was plotting with the Pope and the Guises to depose her, to espouse Mary Queen of Scots, and to seize the crown of England. Elizabeth's assistance to the Netherlanders had hitherto been confined to small grants of money; but, although Philip II. appears to have disapproved of the scheme of Don John, she now adopted more warlike counsels, and in 1577 made a treaty with the States, by which she agreed to send 5000 foot and 1000 horse into Flanders, to be paid for by the States, and commanded by a general of her own, who was to be received into the Council. She also agreed to lend them 100,000l. for which she was to receive the bonds of some of the chief towns in the Netherlands for her repayment within a year. This treaty was signed January 7th 1578, and the English forces, under Sir John Norris, proceeded into the Netherlands.

1

It being now plain that the acceptance of Don John as governor could be accomplished only by force, Philip II. assembled an army of about 20,000 Spanish and Italian veterans, which he intrusted to the command of Alexander Farnese, son of Ottavio Duke of

1 Camden's Elizabeth, vol. i. p. 373 (ed. 1625).