institutions and the manners of the Netherlanders. Even a great number
of the Catholics in the provinces were averse to it. Many of the leading
grandees, every one of whom was Catholic were foremost in denouncing its
continuance. In short, the inquisition had been partially endured, but
never accepted. Moreover, it had never been introduced into Luxemburg or
Groningen. In Gelderland it had been prohibited by the treaty through
which that province had been annexed to the emperor's dominions, and it
had been uniformly and successfully resisted in Brabant. Therefore,
although Philip, taking the artful advice of Granvelle, had sheltered
himself under the Emperor's name by re-enacting, word for word, his
decrees, and re-issuing his instructions, he can not be allowed any such
protection at the bar of history. Such a defence for crimes so enormous
is worse than futile. In truth, both father and son recognized
instinctively the intimate connexion between ideas of religious and of
civil freedom. "The authority of God and the supremacy of his Majesty"
was the formula used with perpetual iteration to sanction the constant
recourse to scaffold and funeral pile. Philip, bigoted in religion, and
fanatical in his creed of the absolute power of kings, identified himself
willingly with the Deity, that he might more easily punish crimes against
his own sacred person. Granvelle carefully sustained him in these
convictions, and fed his suspicions as to the motives of those who
opposed his measures. The minister constantly represented the great
seigniors as influenced by ambition and pride. They had only disapproved
of the new bishoprics, he insinuated, because they were angry that his
Majesty should dare to do anything without their concurrence, and because
their own influence in the states would be diminished. It was their
object, he said, to keep the King "in tutelage"--to make him a "shadow
and a cipher," while they should themselves exercise all authority in the
provinces. It is impossible to exaggerate the effect of such suggestions
upon the dull and gloomy mind to which they were addressed. It is easy,