The Revolt of The Netherlands - Friedrich Schiller (novel24 .TXT) 📗

then passing to the last point, which related to the Duke of Alva, but the prince, who did not wish to have this part of his discourse canvassed, interrupted him. "The king was coming to the Netherlands," he said, "and he knew the king. The king would not endure that one of his servants should have wedded a Lutheran, and he had therefore resolved to go with his whole family into voluntary banishment before he was obliged to submit to the same by compulsion. But," he concluded, "wherever he might be, he would always conduct himself as a subject of the king." Thus far-fetched were the motives which the prince adduced to avoid touching upon the single one which really decided him.

Berti had still a hope of obtaining, through Egmont's eloquence, what by his own he despaired of effecting. He therefore proposed a meeting with the latter (1567), which the prince assented to the more willingly as he himself felt a desire to embrace his friend once more before his departure, and if possible to snatch the deluded man from certain destruction. This remarkable meeting, at which the private secretary, Berti, and the young Count Mansfeld, were also present, was the last that the two friends ever held, and took place in Villebroeck, a village on the Rupel, between Brussels and Antwerp. The Calvinists, whose last hope rested on the issue of this conference, found means to acquaint themselves of its import by a spy, who concealed himself in the chimney of the apartment where it was held. All three attempted to shake the determination of the prince, but their united eloquence was unable to move him from his purpose. "It will cost you your estates, Orange, if you persist in this intention," said the Prince of Gaure, as he took him aside to a window. "And you your life, Egmont, if you change not yours," replied the former. "To me it will at least be a consolation in my misfortunes that I desired, in deed as well as in word, to help my country and my friends in the hour of need; but you, my friend, you are dragging friends and country with you to destruction." And saying these words, he once again exhorted him, still more urgently than ever, to return to the cause of his country, which his arm alone was yet able to preserve; if not, at least for his own sake to avoid the tempest which was gathering against him from Spain.

But all the arguments, however lucid, with which a far-discerning prudence supplied him, and however urgently enforced, with all the ardor and animation which the tender anxiety of friendship could alone inspire, did not avail to destroy the fatal confidence which still fettered Egmont's better reason. The warning of Orange seemed to come from a sad and dispirited heart; but for Egmont the world still smiled. To abandon the pomp and affluence in which he had grown up to youth and manhood; to part with all the thousand conveniences of life which alone made it valuable to him, and all this to escape an evil which his buoyant spirit regarded as remote, if not imaginary; no, that was not a sacrifice which could be asked from Egmont. But had he even been less given to indulgence than he was, with what heart could he have consigned a princess, accustomed by uninterrupted prosperity to ease and comfort, a wife who loved him as dearly as she was beloved, the children on whom his soul hung in hope and fondness, to privations at the prospect of which his own courage sank, and which a sublime philosophy alone can enable sensuality to undergo. "You will never persuade me, Orange," said Egmont, "to see things in the gloomy light in which they appear to thy mournful prudence. When I have succeeded in abolishing the public preachings, and chastising the Iconoclasts, in crushing the rebels, and restoring peace and order in the provinces, what can the king lay to my charge? The king is good and just; I have claims upon his gratitude, and I must not forget what I owe to myself." "Well, then," cried Orange, indignantly and with bitter anguish, "trust, if you will, to this royal gratitude; but a mournful presentiment tells me - and may Heaven grant that I am deceived! - that you, Egmont, will be the bridge by which the Spaniards will pass into our country to destroy it." After these words, he drew him to his bosom, ardently clasping him in his arms. Long, as though the sight was to serve for the remainder of his life, did he keep his eyes fixed upon him; the tears fell; they saw each other no more.

The very next day the Prince of Orange wrote his letter of resignation to the regent, in which he assured her of his perpetual esteem, and once again entreated her to put the best interpretation on his present step. He then set off with his three brothers and his whole family for his own town of Breda, where he remained only as long as was requisite to arrange some private affairs. His eldest son, Prince Philip William, was left behind at the University of Louvain, where he thought him sufficiently secure under the protection of the privileges of Brabant and the immunities of the academy; an imprudence which, if it was really not designed, can hardly be reconciled with the just estimate which, in so many other cases, he had taken of the character of his adversary. In Breda the heads of the Calvinists once more consulted him whether there was still hope for them, or whether all was irretrievably lost. "He had before advised them," replied the prince, "and must now do so again, to accede to the Confession of Augsburg; then they might rely upon aid from Germany. If they would still not consent to this, they must raise six hundred thousand florins, or more, if they could." "The first," they answered, "was at variance with their conviction and their conscience; but means might perhaps be found to raise the money if he would only let them know for what purpose he would use it." "No!" cried he, with the utmost displeasure, "if I must tell you that, it is all over with the use of it." With these words he immediately broke off the conference and dismissed the deputies.

The Prince of Orange was reproached with having squandered his fortune, and with favoring the innovations on account of his debts; but he asserted that he still enjoyed sixty thousand florins yearly rental. Before his departure he borrowed twenty thousand florins from the states of Holland on the mortgage of some manors. Men could hardly persuade themselves that he would have succumbed to necessity so entirely, and without an effort at resistance given up all his hopes and schemes. But what he secretly meditated no one knew, no one had read in his heart. Being asked how he intended to conduct himself towards the King of Spain, "Quietly," was his answer, "unless he touches my honor or my estates." He left the Netherlands soon afterwards, and betook himself in retirement to the town of Dillenburg, in Nassau, at which place he was born. He was accompanied to Germany by many hundreds, either as his servants or as volunteers, and was soon followed by Counts Hogstraten, Kuilemberg, and Bergen, who preferred to share a voluntary exile with him rather than recklessly involve themselves in an uncertain destiny. In his departure the nation saw the flight of its guardian angel; many had adored, all had honored him. With him the last stay of the Protestants gave way; they, however, had greater hopes from this man in exile than from all the others together who remained behind. Even the Roman Catholics could not witness his departure without regret. Them also had he shielded from tyranny; he had not unfrequently protected them against the oppression of their own church, and he had rescued many of them from the sanguinary jealousy of their religious opponents. A few fanatics among the Calvinists, who were offended with his proposal of an alliance with their brethren, who avowed the Confession of Augsburg, solemnized with secret thanksgivings the day on which the enemy left them. (1567).


DECAY AND DISPERSION OF THE GEUSEN LEAGUE.

Immediately after taking leave of his friend, the Prince of Gaure hastened back to Brussels, to receive from the regent the reward of his firmness, and there, in the excitement of the court and in the sunshine of his good fortune, to dispel the light cloud which the earnest warnings of the Prince of Orange had cast over his natural gayety. The flight of the latter now left him in possession of the stage. He had now no longer any rival in the republic to dim his glory. With redoubled zeal he wooed the transient favor of the court, above which he ought to have felt himself far exalted. All Brussels must participate in his joy. He gave splendid banquets and public entertainments, at which, the better to eradicate all suspicion from his mind, the regent herself frequently attended. Not content with having taken the required oath, he outstripped the most devout in devotion; outran the most zealous in zeal to extirpate the Protestant faith, and to reduce by force of arms the refractory towns of Flanders. He declared to his old friend, Count Hogstraten, as also to the rest of the Gueux, that he would withdraw from them his friendship forever if they hesitated any longer to return into the bosom of the church, and reconcile themselves with their king. All the confidential letters which had been exchanged between him and them were returned, and by this last step the breach between them was made public and irreparable. Egmont's secession, and the flight of the Prince of Orange, destroyed the last hope of the Protestants and dissolved the whole league of the Gueux. Its members vied with each other in readiness - nay, they could not soon enough abjure the covenant and take the new oath proposed to them by the government. In vain did the Protestant merchants exclaim at this breach of faith on the part of the nobles; their weak voice was no longer listened to, and all the sums were lost with which they had supplied the league.

The most important places were quickly reduced and garrisoned; the rebels had fled, or perished by the hand of the executioner; in the provinces no protector was left. All yielded to the fortune of the regent, and her victorious army was advancing against Antwerp. After a long and obstinate contest this town had been cleared of the worst rebels; Hermann and his adherents took to flight; the internal storms had spent their rage. The minds of the people became gradually composed, and no longer excited at will by every furious fanatic, began to listen to better counsels. The wealthier citizens earnestly longed for peace to revive commerce and trade, which had suffered severely from the long reign of anarchy. The dread of Alva's approach worked wonders; in order to prevent the miseries which a Spanish army would inflict upon the country, the people hastened to throw themselves on the gentler mercies of the regent. Of their own accord they despatched plenipotentiaries to Brussels to negotiate for a treaty and to hear her terms. Agreeably as the regent was surprised by this voluntary step, she did not allow herself to be hurried away by her joy. She declared that she neither could nor would listen to any overtures or representations until the town had received a garrison. Even this was no longer opposed, and Count Mansfeld marched in the day after with sixteen squadrons in battle array. A solemn treaty was now made