Spaniards alone about his person, and it was to Spaniards that all
vacant posts were assigned. Besides, certain of his measures gave
great dissatisfaction. He re-enacted the persecuting edicts against
the Protestants which his father, in the end of his reign, had
suffered to fall into disuse; and the severities which ensued began to
drive hundreds of the most useful citizens out of the country, as well
as to injure trade by deterring Protestant merchants from the Dutch
and Flemish ports. Dark hints, too, were thrown out that he intended
to establish an ecclesiastical court in the Netherlands similar to the
Spanish Inquisition, and the spirit of Catholics as well as
Protestants revolted from the thought that this chamber of horrors
should ever become one of the institutions of their free land.

14. He had also increased the number of bishops in the Netherlands
from five to seventeen; and this was regarded as the mere appointment
of twelve persons devoted to the Spanish interest, who would help, if
necessary, to overawe the people. Lastly, he kept the provinces full
of Spanish troops, and this was in direct violation of a fundamental
law of the country.

15. Against these measures the nobles and citizens complained
bitterly, and from them drew sad anticipations of the future. Nor were
they more satisfied with the address in which, through the bishop of
Arras as his spokesman, he took farewell of them at a convention of
the states held at Ghent previous to his departure to Spain. The
oration recommended severity against heresy, and only promised the
withdrawal of the foreign troops. The reply of the states was firm and
bold, and the recollection of it must have rankled afterward in the
revengeful mind of Philip. "I would rather be no king at all," he said
to one of his ministers at the time, "than have heretics for my