was fitter to buckle with them" than Robinson. The orthodox professor
Polyander so importuned the English Puritan to enter the lists on behalf
of the Contra-Remonstrants that at last he consented and overthrew the
challenger, horse and man, in three successive encounters. Such at least
was the account given by his friend and admirer the historian. "The Lord
did so help him to defend the truth and foil this adversary as he put him
to an apparent nonplus in this great and public audience. And the like
he did a second or third time upon such like occasions," said Bradford,
adding that, if it had not been for fear of offending the English
government, the university would have bestowed preferments and honours
upon the champion.

We are concerned with this ancient and exhausted controversy only for the
intense light it threw, when burning, on the history which occupies us.

Of the extinct volcano itself which once caused such devastation, and in
which a great commonwealth was well-nigh swallowed up, little is left but
slag and cinders. The past was made black and barren with them. Let us
disturb them as little as possible.

The little English congregation remained at Leyden till toward the end of
the Truce, thriving, orderly, respected, happy. They were witnesses to
the tumultuous, disastrous, and tragical events which darkened the
Republic in those later years, themselves unobserved and unmolested. Not
a syllable seems to remain on record of the views or emotions which may
have been excited by those scenes in their minds, nor is there a trace
left on the national records of the Netherlands of their protracted
residence on the soil.

They got their living as best they might by weaving, printing, spinning,