The King also expressed his gratification at hearing from Parma that the
demand for religious liberty in the Netherlands would soon be abandoned.

"In spite of the vehemence," he said, "which they manifest in the
religious matter, desiring some kind of liberty, they will in the end,
as you say they will, content themselves with what the other cities,
which have returned to obedience, have obtained. This must be done in
all cases without flinching, and without permitting any modification."

What "had been obtained" by Brussels, Mechlin, Ghent, was well known.
The heretics had obtained the choice of renouncing their religion or of
going into perpetual exile, and this was to be the case "without
flinching" in Holland and Zeeland, if those provinces chose to return to
obedience. Yet Sainte Aldegonde deluded himself with the thought of a
religious peace.

In another and very important letter of the same date Philip laid down
his policy very distinctly. The Prince of Parma, by no means such a
bigot as his master, had hinted at the possibility of tolerating the
reformed religion in the places recovered from the rebels, sub silentio,
for a period not defined, and long enough for the heretics to awake from
their errors.

"You have got an expression of opinion, I see," wrote the King to
Alexander, "of some grave men of wisdom and conscience, that the
limitation of time, during which the heretics may live without scandal,
may be left undefined; but I feel very keenly the danger of such a
proposition. With regard to Holland and Zeeland, or any other provinces
or towns, the first step must be for them to receive and maintain alone
the exercise of the Catholic religion, and to subject themselves to the