beside, a body of statutes and regulations, made from time to time by its
own authority and confirmed by the prince. Thus a large portion, at
least, of the nation shared practically in the legislative functions,
which, technically, it did not claim; nor had the requirements of society
made constant legislation so necessary, as that to exclude the people
from the work was to enslave the country. There was popular power enough
to effect much good, but it was widely scattered, and, at the same time,
confined in artificial forms. The guilds were vassals of the towns, the
towns, vassals of the feudal lord. The guild voted in the "broad council"
of the city as one person; the city voted in the estates as one person.
The people of the United Netherlands was the personage yet to be
invented, It was a privilege, not a right, to exercise a handiwork, or to
participate in the action of government. Yet the mass of privileges was
so large, the shareholders so numerous, that practically the towns were
republics. The government was in the hands of a large number of the
people. Industry and intelligence led to wealth and power. This was great
progress from the general servitude of the 11th and 12th centuries, an
immense barrier against arbitrary rule. Loftier ideas of human rights,
larger conceptions of commerce, have taught mankind, in later days, the
difference between liberties and liberty, between guilds and free
competition. At the same time it was the principle of mercantile
association, in the middle ages, which protected the infant steps of
human freedom and human industry against violence and wrong. Moreover, at
this period, the tree of municipal life was still green and vigorous. The
healthful flow of sap from the humblest roots to the most verdurous
branches indicated the internal soundness of the core, and provided for
the constant development of exterior strength. The road to political
influence was open to all, not by right of birth, but through honorable
exertion of heads and hands.