over the proceedings to be instituted against the suspected. All who know
of any person tainted with heresy are required to denounce and give them
up to all judges, officers of the bishops, or others having authority on
the premises, on pain of being punished according to the pleasure of the
judge. Likewise, all shall be obliged, who know of any place where such
heretics keep themselves, to declare them to the authorities, on pain of
being held as accomplices, and punished as such heretics themselves would
be if apprehended."

In order to secure the greatest number of arrests by a direct appeal to
the most ignoble, but not the least powerful principle of human nature,
it was ordained "that the informer, in case of conviction, should be
entitled to one half the property of the accused, if not more than one
hundred pounds Flemish; if more, then ten per cent. of all such excess."

Treachery to one's friends was encouraged by the provision, "that if any
man being present at any secret conventicle, shall afterwards come
forward and betray his fellow-members of the congregation, he shall
receive full pardon."

In order that neither the good people of the Netherlands, nor the judges
and inquisitors should delude themselves with the notion that these
fanatic decrees were only intended to inspire terror, not for practical
execution, the sovereign continued to ordain--"to the end that the judges
and officers may have no reason, under pretext that the penalties are too
great and heavy and only devised to terrify delinquents, to punish them
less severely than they deserve--that the culprits be really punished by
the penalties above declared; forbidding all judges to alter or moderate
the penalties in any manner forbidding any one, of whatsoever condition,
to ask of us, or of any one having authority, to grant pardon, or to