man shall fill two offices. No office shall be farmed. The 'Great Council
and Supreme Court of Holland' is re-established. Causes shall be brought
before it on appeal from the ordinary courts. It shall have no original
jurisdiction of matters within the cognizance of the provincial and
municipal tribunals. The estates and cities are guaranteed in their right
not to be summoned to justice beyond the limits of their territory. The
cities, in common with all the provinces of the Netherlands, may hold
diets as often ten and at such places as they choose. No new taxes shall
be imposed but by consent of the provincial estates. Neither the duchess
nor her descendants shall begin either an offensive or defensive war
without consent of the estates. In case a war be illegally undertaken,
the estates are not bound to contribute to its maintenance. In all public
and legal documents, the Netherland language shall be employed. The
commands of the duchess shall be invalid, if conflicting with the
privileges of a city.

"The seat of the Supreme Council is transferred from Mechlin to the
Hague. No money shall be coined, nor its value raised or lowered, but by
consent of the estates. Cities are not to be compelled to contribute to
requests which they have not voted. The sovereign shall come in person
before the estates, to make his request for supplies."

Here was good work. The land was rescued at a blow from the helpless
condition to which it had been reduced. This summary annihilation of all
the despotic arrangements of Charles was enough to raise him from his
tomb. The law, the sword, the purse, were all taken from the hand of the
sovereign and placed within the control of parliament. Such sweeping
reforms, if maintained, would restore health to the body politic. They
gave, moreover, an earnest of what was one day to arrive. Certainly, for
the fifteenth century, the "Great Privilege" was a reasonably liberal