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THE
HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, from the birth of Christ to the
18th Century: including the very interesting account of the
Waldenses and Albigenses
By William Jones
First Edition 1812
Fourth Edition 1819
Fifth Edition 1826
London: Printed for the Author by W. Myers, 7, Took’s Court,
Castle Street, Holborn
[Note from the publisher. This valuable out-of-print book was carefully formatted for electronic publication by Way of Life Literature. For a catalog of other books, both current and old, in print and electronic format, contact us at P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, fbns@wayoflife.org (e-mail), http://www.wayoflife.org (web site).]
[Table of Contents for "A History of the Christian Church" by William Jones]
CHAPTER SIX -- SECTION 3
A VIEW OF THE CONDUCT OF THE COURT OF ROME, AND THE OPERATION OF ITS FAVORITE INSTRUMENT, THE INQUISITION, ABOUT THE MIDDLE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY; INCLUDING DETAILS OF THE HORRID CRUELTIES EXERCISED TOWARDS THE FRIENDS OF REFORM, PARTICULARLY IN SPAIN AND THE NETHERLANDS. A.D. 1550-1557
Having devoted a former section to the purpose of tracing the rise, spirit, operation, and progress of that infernal instrument of cruelty, known by the name of the Inquisition; that we may not wholly lose sight of the influence of this engine of spiritual despotism, we shall, for a moment, suspend the immediate narrative of the Waldenses in France and Piedmont, in order that we may take a cursory view of the state of affairs, in reference to religion, in Spain and the Netherlands, at the period at which we are now arrived, namely, about twenty years after the Reformation by Luther.
It is scarcely necessary for me to state, that, in the succession of kings by whom SPAIN had been governed for about the space of three hundred years, the popes of Rome had generally found a race of obsequious princes, seldom reluctant to yield their concurrence with any measures that might be proposed for the destruction of heretics. But it was now the misfortune of that country to possess a monarch whose zeal for the extirpation of heretical pravity, surpassed even that of popes and cardinals. This monarch was PHILIP II son of the emperor Charles V and of Isbella, daughter of Immanuel the Great, king of Portugal. He was born on the 27th of May, 1527, and educated in Spain, under ecclesiastics noted for their bigotry, which may account for several of those features in his character that afterwards appeared so prominently in his conduct. He was the most powerful monarch of the age; for, besides the government of Spain, he possessed the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily; the duchy of Milan, Franche Compte and the Netherlands, or, as they were then generally termed, the Low Countries.
These provinces, which, on account of their situation, are called the Netherlands, had been long governed by their respective princes, under the titles of dukes, marquises, or counts; and under the administration of the princes of the house of Burgundy, they had flourished in trade, commerce, and manufactures, beyond any other European state. No city in those days, except Venice, possessed such extensive commerce as Antwerp. It was the great mart of all the northern nations. Bruges was little inferior; and in the city of Ghent there were many thousand artificers employed in the woolen manufacture, long before the art was known to the English, from whom the wool was purchased by the industrious Flemings. In consequence of the constant intercourse which subsisted between Germany and the Netherlands, we may naturally suppose that the doctrines of the Reformers would be early propagated from the former to the latter country; and, accordingly in the month of May, 1521, even before the days of Philip, his father, the emperor Charles V had published an edict, in which all the penalties of high treason were pronounced against heretics. In the execution of this edict, which Charles from time to time renewed, all the fury of persecution was exercised; and it is affirmed by several contemporary historians, that, during his reign, fifty thousand of the inhabitants of the Netherlands were put to death on account of their religious principles. [Paul’s History of the Council of Trent, book 5; Grotius doubles the number!] These principles, however, far from being extirpated became more generally propagated and diffused amidst the severities which were employed to suppress them.
Before the emperor Charles V had resigned the reins of government to his son Philip, great numbers of his subjects had begun to retire from the provinces of the Netherlands and to transport their families and effects to the neighboring states; and when he was informed of this, by the regent, who was his sister, and queen dowager of Hungary, his heart relented for the calamities of his people, and he dreaded the consequences of depopulating a country from which he had often received the most effectual assistance and support. But these considerations had no influence on his son Philip. He republished the edicts of his father, and ordered the governors and magistrates to carry them into rigorous execution. In these edicts it was enacted, that all persons who held erroneous opinions in religion, should be deprived of their offices, and degraded from their rank. It was ordained, that whoever should be convicted of having taught heretical doctrines, or of having been present at the religious meetings of heretics, should, if they were men, be put to death by the sword; and, if women, be burned alive. Such were the punishments denounced even against those who repented of their errors and forsook them; while all who persisted in them were condemned to the flames. And even those who afforded shelter to heretics in their houses, or who omitted to give information against them, were subjected to the same penalties as heretics themselves.
But Philip could not content himself with publishing and executing these cruel edicts. He also established a particular tribunal for the extirpation of heresy, which, although it was not called by the name Inquisition, had all the essentials of that iniquitous institution. Persons were committed to prison upon bare suspicion, and put to the torture on the slightest evidence. The accused were not confronted with their accusers, or made acquainted with the crimes for which they suffered. The civil judges were not allowed to take any further concern in prosecutions for heresy, than to execute the sentences which the inquisitors pronounced. The possessions of the sufferers were confiscated; and informers were encouraged by an assurance of impunity in case they themselves were guilty, and by the promise of rewards. [Grotius, Annales, lib. 1.]
That the establishment of this arbitrary tribunal should have excited considerable commotion in the NETHERLANDS, can occasion no surprise. It had created disturbances even in Spain and Italy, where civil liberty was not enjoyed in the measure that it was in the Netherlands. Among the Flemings, therefore, it excited the most terrible apprehensions; they considered it as utterly subversive of their liberty. But to the grievances already enumerated, the inhabitants of the Netherlands further complained that the provinces were filled with Spanish soldiers, whose insolent and rapacious behavior was intolerable. And to all these causes of discontent, Philip added another by increasing the number of bishoprics, from five to seventeen, which was the number of the provinces. These new bishops were regarded as so many new inquisitors; and their creation was considered as an encroachment on the privileges of the provinces, and a violation on the part of the king, of the oath which he had taken at his accession, to preserve the church in the condition in which he found it. Such was the state of affairs, when Philip, who had for some time taken up his residence among his subjects in the Netherlands, proposed in the year 1559, to quit the country and fix the seat of his government in Spain. During his absence the government of the Netherlands was conferred upon the Duchess of Parma, who was a natural daughter of the late emperor, and who sustained the title of regent.
As Philip did not intend to return speedily to the Netherlands, he thought proper, before his departure, to summon a convention of the states, which was accordingly held at Ghent. He himself was present, accompanied by the new regent, at the first opening of the assembly; but as he could not speak the language of the country, he employed the Bishop of Arras to address the deputies in his name. Among other things, the latter was instructed earnestly to exhort the states to study to preserve the public peace; and to this end he thought nothing could conduce so much as the extirpation of heresy, which, whilst it set men at variance with God, put arms into their hands against their civil sovereign. They were, therefore, strenuously exhorted to maintain the purity of their ancient faith; and for this purpose, to execute vigorously the several edicts published for the suppression of heresy.
The reply of the deputies of the states to this speech, contained the warmest sentiments of loyalty, but it was also accompanied with intimations, that they had expected the foreign troops would have been immediately transported to Spain, that they were unable to discover any reason for keeping them any longer in the Netherlands, but such as filled their minds with terror. Their suspicion that the Inquisition was about to be established in the Netherlands, excited the most disquieting apprehensions. Some of the deputies did not scruple to remonstrate openly, that the Netherlands had never been accustomed to an institution of so much rigor and severity; that the people trembled at the very name of the Inquisition, and would fly to the remotest corners of the earth rather than submit to it; that it was not by fire and the sword, but by the gentlest and softest remedies, that the evil complained of must be cured. Various representations of this kind were addressed to the king himself by some of the deputies, who endeavored to persuade him at least to moderate the edicts, if he would not entirely annul them; but on this head Philip was inexorable. And when one of his ministers reported, that, by persisting in the execution of those edicts, he might kindle the seeds of rebellion, and thereby lose the sovereignty of the provinces; he replied, "That he had much rather be no king at all, than have heretics for his subjects" [Bentivoglio. lib. 1, p. 9,10].
His religion was, of all superstitions, the most intolerant; his temper of mind, which was naturally haughty and severe; his pride which would have been wounded by yielding to what he had repeatedly declared he would never yield; his engagements with the pope, and an oath which he had taken to devote his reign to the defense of the popish faith and the extirpation of heresy; above all, his thirst for despotic power, with which he considered the liberties claimed in religious matters by the Protestants as utterly incompatible; all these united causes, rendered him deaf to the remonstrances which were made to him, and fixed him unalterably in his resolution to execute the edicts with the utmost rigor. He showed himself equally inflexible with regard to the new bishoprics: nor would he consent, at this time, to withdraw the Spanish soldiers. In order, however, to lessen the odium arising from his refusal, he offered the command of these troops to the Prince of Orange and Count Egmont, the two ablest and most popular noblemen in the Netherlands; the former of whom he had appointed governor of Holland, Zealand, and Utretch; and the latter of Artois and Flanders. Both of them declined accepting of the offer which was made to them and had the courage to declare, that they considered the continuance of the troops in the Low Countries, after peace had been established in France, as a violation of the fundamental laws of the constitution.
The Prince of Orange, so well known in history by the name of William the First, was the representative of the ancient and illustrious family of Nassau in Germany. From his ancestors, one of whom had been Emperor of Germany, he inherited several rich possessions in the Netherlands and he had succeeded to the principality of Orange by the will of Rene Nassau and Chalons, his cousin-german, in the year 1544. From that time the late emperor had kept him perpetually about his person, and had early discovered in him all those extraordinary talents which rendered him afterwards one of the most illustrious personages of the age. It does not appear, that, before the assembly of the states, Philip had any just ground for his suspicions of William’s conduct; and there is only one circumstance recorded to which they can be ascribed. The prince having been sent to France as an hostage for the execution of some articles of the peace of Chateau-Cambresis, had, during his residence there, discovered a scheme formed by the French and Spanish monarchs for the extirpation of the Protestants. This scheme he had communicated to such of his friends in the Netherlands as had embraced the reformed religion, and from that time the king ceased to treat him with his wonted confidence. [Thuanus, tom. 1, lib. 22. sect. 10.]
On the 20th of August, 1559, Philip set sail from the Netherlands with a fleet of seventy ships, and on the 29th arrived at Loredo, in the province of Biscay. He reached the port in safety; but no sooner had he landed than a dreadful storm arose, in which a part of his fleet was shipwrecked; above a thousand men perished, and a great number of capital paintings, statues, and other curious works of art were lost, which the late emperor, Charles, had been employed, during forty years, in collecting in Germany, Italy, and Flanders. Philip thought he could not, on this occasion, better express his gratitude for his own personal preservation, than by declaring his resolution to dedicate his life to the defense of the catholic faith and the extirpation of heresy; and such were the feelings with which he was animated when he entered Spain.
The Inquisition had been introduced into Spain about a century before this time, as hath already been noticed in a former section of this work; and it met with the entire approbation and countenance of Philip, who had imbibed, in all its virulence, that spirit of bigotry and persecution which gave it birth. He regarded heretics as the most odious of criminals; and considered a departure of his subjects from the Roman superstition, as the most dreadful calamity that could befall them. He was, therefore, determined to support the inquisitors with all his power; and he encouraged them to exert themselves in the exercise of their office with the utmost vigilance. The zeal and diligence of these men corresponded to the ardor with which their sovereign was inflamed; yet so irresistible was the spirit of inquiry and the force of truth, that the opinions of the Reformers had found their way into Spain, and were embraced openly by great numbers of both sexes, among whom were several priests and nuns. Before Philip’s arrival in the city of Valladolid, an auto-de-fe had been celebrated, in which a great number of Protestants had been committed to the flames. There were still in the prisons of the Inquisition more than thirty persons, against whom the same dreadful punishment had been denounced. Philip, eager to give public proof as early as possible of his abhorrence of these innovators, desired the inquisitors to fix a day for their execution; and he resolved to witness it. The dreadful ceremony (more repugnant to humanity, as well as to the spirit of the Christian religion, than the most abominable sacrifices recorded in the annals of the Pagan world) was conducted with the greatest solemnity which the inquisitors could devise; and Philip, attended by his son Don Carlos, by his sister, and by his courtiers and guards, sat within sight of the unhappy victims. After hearing a sermon from the bishop of Zamora, he rose from his seat, and having drawn his sword, as a signal, that with it he would defend the holy faith, he took an oath administered to him by the inquisitor-general, to support the inquisition and its ministers against all heretics and apostates, and to compel his subjects every where to yield obedience to its decrees. Among the Protestants condemned, there was a nobleman of the name of Don Carlos di Sessa, who, when the executioners were conducting him to the stake, called out to the king for mercy, saying, "And canst thou thus O king! witness the torments of thy subjects? Save us from this cruel death; we do not deserve it." "No," Philip sternly replied, "I would myself carry wood to burn my own son, were he such a wretch as thou." After which he beheld the horrid spectacle that followed, with a composure and tranquillity that betokened the most unfeeling heart.
This dreadful severity, joined with certain rigid laws, enacted to prevent the importation of Lutheran books, soon produced the desired effect. After the celebration of another auto-de-fe, in which about fifty protestants suffered, all the rest, if there were any still remaining, either concealed their sentiments, or made their escape into foreign parts. [Watson’s History of Philip II, Volume 1. book 4.]
But though Philip had, for a moment, banished the heretics from his Spanish dominions, he had the mortification to contemplate the rapid progress of heresy in almost every other state in Europe; and in order to obstruct it, he employed all his influence to procure the convocation of a general council of the church. For several centuries before the Reformation, and for some time after it had been set on foot, the bigotry of the Papists would not suffer them to think of any other means of extirpating the opinions of the Protestants, but persecution; which was exercised against them with the same unrelenting severity, as if they had been guilty of the most atrocious crimes. But it soon appeared how inadequate this barbarous procedure was to the purpose which the Romanists intended. Those bloody edicts which were published, those fires which were lighted up, and that variety of torments which priests and inquisitors invented with ingenious cruelty, served in reality to propagate the doctrines against which they were employed, and contributed to inflame, rather than extinguish, that ardent zeal with which the Protestants were animated. Being firmly persuaded, that the cause which they maintained, was the cause of God and truth, and that their perseverance would be rewarded with a happy immortality, they courted their punishments instead of avoiding them; and, in bearing them, displayed a degree of fortitude and patience, which, by exciting admiration in the beholders, produced innumerable proselytes to the faith for which they suffered.
Several princes had been converted to that faith. In some states the Protestants had become more numerous and powerful than their opponents; and in others, their opinions so generally prevailed, that the catholic princes found it no longer possible to extirpate them, without depriving themselves of great multitudes of their most industrious subjects, on whom the wealth and importance of their states depended. The time when persecution might have proved effectual was past, and the princes came at length to perceive the necessity of having recourse to some more gentle means than had been hitherto employed. They were, at the same time, sensible, notwithstanding their prejudices against the Reformers, some reformation was extremely necessary; they had long borne with great impatience the numberless encroachments of the court of Rome; and were convinced, that if some abuses were removed, it would not be impracticable to persuade many of the Protestants to return into the bosom of the church.
A general council appeared to be the only expedient by which this important end could be obtained; and the late emperor Charles had taken infinite pains to procure the convocation of that assembly. In former times the councils of the church had been convened by the emperors themselves; but, in the time of Charles, the power of calling them was, by all true Catholics, considered as the peculiar prerogative of the popes; who dreaded that such assemblies might derogate from their usurped authority, and were therefore inclined, if possible, to prevent them from being held. With the timid Clement, Charles employed all his art and influence to procure a council, but in vain. Paul the third was no less averse to this measure than Clement; but the emperor being seconded by almost all the catholic princes in Europe, Paul yielded to their importunities, and summoned a council to meet in TRENT. From this place it was afterwards translated to Bologna. After the death of Paul it was again assembled in Trent, in 1551, and continued to be held there till the year following; when it was delayed for two years, upon war being declared against the emperor by the Elector of Saxony.
In the sessions which were held under Paul, that fundamental tenet of the reformers, by which the writings of the evangelists and apostles are held to be the only rule of the Christian faith, was condemned; and equal authority was ascribed to the books termed Apocryphal, and to the oral traditions of the church. From the manner in which the deliberations of this assembly were conducted; from the nature of its decisions, and from the blind attachment of a great majority of its members to the court of Rome, there was little ground to hope for the attainment of those ends for which the calling of it had been so earnestly desired. But no other expedient could be devised, which the Catholics thought so likely to stop the progress of heresy; and, therefore, as soon as the war between France and Spain was concluded, the several Catholics began to think seriously of the restoration of the council.
The state of Europe at that time seemed, more than ever, to require the application of some immediate remedy, The power and the number of the Protestants were every day becoming more and more considerable. Both England and Scotland had disclaimed allegiance to the See of Rome, and new-modeled their religion. In the Netherlands the reformers had greatly multiplied of late, notwithstanding the most dreadful cruelties had been exercised against them; and in France, where every province was involved in the most terrible combustion, there was ground to apprehend, that they would soon become too powerful for the Catholics, and be able to wrest from them the reins of government. The new opinions had penetrated even into Italy, and had been embraced by a considerable number of persons both in Naples and Savoy. From the former of these states they were extirpated by the unrelenting severity of Philip; who issued orders to his viceroy to put all heretics to death without mercy, and even to pursue with fire and sword a remnant of them who had fled from Cosenza, and were living quietly among the mountains. [F. Paul, lib. 5.]
But the Duke of Savoy, unwilling to deprive himself of so great a number of useful subjects as at that time professed the protestant faith, was inclined to attempt to enlighten and convince them; and with this view he desired the pope’s permission to hold a colloquy of the principal ecclesiastics in his dominions, on the subject of religion. Pius was about the same time informed, that in France a resolution had been embraced to have recourse to the same expedient. He believed that no measure could be devised more likely to prove fatal to that exclusive prerogative which he claimed of judging in matters of religion. He dreaded that the example of France and Savoy would be quickly followed by other states, and the decrees of provincial synods substituted in the place of those of the Holy See. It highly concerned him, therefore, to prevent this measure (so pernicious to his authority) from taking place. Nor did he find much difficulty in dissuading the Duke of Savoy from adopting it. "If the heretics," said he to the duke’s ambassador, "stand in need of instruction, I will send divines and a legate, by whom they may be both instructed and absolved. But your master will find, that they will lend a deaf ear to all the instructions that can be given them, and will put no other interpretation upon his conduct, but that he wants power to compel them to submit. No good effect was ever produced by that lenity which he inclines to exercise; but from experience he may learn, that the sooner he shall execute justice on these men, and make use of force to reduce them, the more certain will be his success; and if he will comply with the counsel which I offer, he shall receive from me such assistance as will enable him to carry it into execution." The Duke, who was sincerely attached to the Romish faith, and closely connected with Philip, unfortunately complied with this violent counsel, and engaged in a bloody war with his Protestant subjects, of which he had afterwards the greatest reason to repent.
But to return to the state of affairs in the Netherlands: the seeds of discord which were sown in that unhappy country, in the beginning of the reign of Philip II continued to approximate towards maturity. At his departure from among them he had given strict orders to the regent to enforce a rigorous execution of his edicts, and the persecutions were, accordingly, carried on as formerly. The council of Trent had published its decrees, and Philip resolved to have them obeyed throughout all his dominions. The disturbances which subsisted in the Low Countries, ought to have deterred him from adding fuel to a flame which already burnt with so much violence. But his bigotry, together with his arbitrary maxims of government, rendered him averse to every mild expedient, and determined him to enforce obedience to the decrees in the Netherlands, as well as in Spain and Italy. When the regent laid his instructions on this head before the council of state, she found the counselors much divided in their opinions. The Prince of Orange maintained, that the regent could not require the people of the Netherlands to receive the decrees, because several of them were contrary to the fundamental laws of the constitution. He represented that some catholic princes had thought proper to reject them; and proposed that a remonstrance should be made to the king on the necessity of recalling his instructions.
"Let us not, by our misrepresentations," said he, "make him believe the number of heretics to be smaller than it is. Let us acquaint him, that every province, every town, every village, is full of them. Let us not conceal from him how much they despise the edicts, and how little they respect the magistrates; that he may see how impracticable it is to introduce the Inquisition, and be convinced that the remedy which be would have us to apply, would be infinitely worse than the disease." He added, "That although he was a true Catholic, and a faithful subject of the king, yet he thought the calamities which had been lately experienced in France and Germany, afforded a sufficient proof that the consciences of men were not to be compelled; and that heresy was not to be extirpated by fire and sword, but by reasoning and persuasion; to which it was in vain to expect that men would be brought to listen, until the present practice of butchering them like beasts was wholly laid aside." He represented likewise the absurdity of publishing, on this occasion, the decrees of the council of Trent, and proposed that Count Egmont should be instructed to request the king to suspend the publication of them till the present tumults were allayed.
Many of the other nobles set on foot, at this time, a confederacy by which they bound themselves to support one another, in preventing the Inquisition from being established in the Netherlands. The prime mover of this expedient was Philip de Marnix, Lord of St. Aldegonde, a nobleman highly distinguished for his eloquence, his address, and his political abilities, who had the merit of contributing more than any other person (the Prince of Orange alone excepted) towards accomplishing that happy revolution, by which the northern provinces were rescued from the Spanish yoke. By his advice, and according to his direction, a writing was drawn up, termed THE COMPROMISE, which is here inserted, as it marks strongly the spirit by which the people of the Netherlands were animated.
"Whereas certain malicious persons, under the cloak of zeal for the catholic religion, but in reality prompted by ambition, pride, and avarice, have by their misrepresentations, persuaded our lord, the king, to introduce into these provinces that most pernicious tribunal the Inquisition, which is not only contrary to all human and divine laws, but exceeds in cruelty the most barbarous institutions of the most savage tyrants in the heathen world; which subjects all authority to that of the inquisitors, reduces all men to a perpetual state of miserable slavery, and by the visitations which it appoints, exposes the best men to continual apprehensions; so that if a priest, a Spaniard, or wicked minion of power, shall incline, he may, by means of this institution, accuse any man, however innocent, and cause him to be imprisoned, condemned, and put to death, without being confronted with his accusers, and without being allowed to bring evidence of his innocence, or to speak in his defense: for these reasons we whose names are hereto subscribed have resolved to provide for the security of our families, goods, and persons; and for this purpose we hereby enter into a sacred league with one another, promising with a solemn oath, to oppose with all our power, the introduction of the above-named Inquisition into these provinces; whether it shall be attempted openly or secretly, and by whatever name it shall be called, whether that of Inquisition, Visitation, Commission, or Edict: declaring at the same time, that we are far from entertaining the design of attempting anything prejudicial to the interest of our sovereign the king; but, on the contrary, that our fixed intention is, to support and defend his government, to maintain peace, and to prevent, to the utmost of our power, all seditions, tumults, and revolts. This agreement we have sworn; and we hereby promise and swear to maintain it for ever sacred; and we call Almighty God to witness, that neither in word or deed shall we ever weaken or counteract it.
"We likewise promise and swear, mutually to defend one another, in all places and on all occasions, against every attack that shall be made, or prosecution that shall be raised, against any individual amongst us, on account of his concern in this confederacy. And we declare, that no pretense of the persecutors, who may allege rebellion, insurrection, or any other plea, shall exempt us from this our oath and promise. No action can deserve the name of rebellion, that proceeds from opposition to the iniquitous decrees of the Inquisition; and, therefore, whether any of us be attacked directly on account of opposing these decrees, or under pretense of punishing rebellion or insurrection, we hereby swear to endeavor, by all lawful means, to procure his deliverance.
"In this and every part of our conduct regarding the inquisition, our meaning is, to submit to the general opinion of our confederates, or to that of those who shall be appointed by the rest to assist us with their counsel.
"In witness of this our league, we invoke the holy name of the living God, as the searcher of our hearts; humbly beseeching him to grant us the grace of his Holy Spirit, and that all our enterprises may be attended with success, may promote the honor of his name, contribute to the welfare of our souls, and advance the peace and true interest of the Netherlands."
Such were the terms of the Compromise, which was quickly circulated through the provinces, and subscribed by persons of all ranks, whether Catholics or Protestants. Books were, at the same time multiplied, in which liberty of conscience was pleaded, the absurdities in the popish doctrines and worship exposed, and hideous pictures drawn of the Inquisition.
The regent felt great anxiety with regard to the consequence with which so much ill-humor and discontent were likely to be attended. She had never fully credited the representations which the Prince of Orange and some of her other counselors had often made to her. And she now complained bitterly of the situation to which she was reduced by the orders sent from Spain. "For to what purpose was it," she added, "to publish edicts, when I wanted power to enforce their execution! They have served only to increase the people’s audacity, and to bring my authority into contempt."
The Prince of Orange, and the counts Horn and Egmont, had, ever since the last republication of the edicts, absented themselves from the council. The regent now wrote to them in the most urgent manner, requiring their attendance. They readily complied; and the regent, after having informed them of her design in calling them together, desired they would deliver their opinions without reserve. The Prince of Orange was among the last who rose, and he spoke as follows:
"Would to heaven, I had been so fortunate as to gain belief, when I ventured to foretell what has now happened. Desperate remedies would not, in that case, have been first applied, nor persons who had fallen into error been confirmed in it, by the means employed to reclaim them. We should not certainly think favorably of a physician’s prudence, who, in the beginning of a disease, when gentle remedies were likely to prove effectual, should propose the burning or cutting off the part infected. There are two species of inquisition. The one is exercised in the name of the pope, and the other has been long practiced by the bishops. To the latter men are, in some measure, reconciled by the power of custom; and considering how well we are now provided with bishops in all the provinces, it may reasonably be expected that this sort will alone be found sufficient. The former has been, and will for ever be, an object of abhorrence, and ought to be abolished without delay.
"With respect to those edicts which have been so often published against the innovators in religion, hearken not to me, but to your own experience, which will inform you, that the persecutions to which they have given rise, have served only to increase and propagate the errors against which they have been exercised. The Netherlands have for several years been a school, in which, if we have not been extremely inattentive, we may have learned the folly of persecution. Men do not for nothing forego the advantages of life; much less do they expose themselves to torture and death for nothing. The contempt of death and pain, exhibited by heretics in suffering for their religion, is calculated to produce the most powerful effects upon the minds of spectators. It works on their compassion, it excites their admiration of the sufferers, and creates in them a suspicion that truth must certainly be found where they observe so much constancy and fortitude. Heretics have been treated with the same severity in France and England as in the Low Countries. But has it been attended there with better success! On the contrary, is there not reason, there as well as here, to say what was said of the Christians of old, that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. The emperor Julian, the most formidable enemy that Christianity ever had, was fully sensible of the truth of this. Harassing and tormenting could only serve, he knew, to inflame that ardent zeal which he wanted to extinguish. He had recourse therefore to the expedient of ridicule and contempt; and this he found to be more effectual. The Grecian empire was, at different periods, infected with heresies of various kinds. AErius taught errors in the reign of Constance; Nestorius in that of Theodosius; Arius in that of Constantine. No such punishments were inflicted, either on the heresiarchs themselves or on their disciples, as are now practiced in the Netherlands; and yet where are all those false opinions now, which the first broachers were at so much pains to propagate? Such is the nature of heresy, if it rests, it rusts; but he who rubs it, whets it. Let it be neglected and overlooked, it will soon lose the charm of novelty; and with that, it will lose the greatest part of its attractive power. But they are not the examples only of heathen princes which I would recommend to the regent’s imitation. In complying with my advice, she will tread in the steps of our late glorious emperor, her father; who, from experience, was convinced, that gentle measures were more likely to prove effectual than severe ones; and therefore adopted the former, in preference to the latter, for several years before his resignation.
"The king himself appeared, at a certain period, inclined to make trial of mild expedients. But, through the influence of the bishops and other ecclesiastics, he has changed his views. Let these men answer for their conduct if they can. For my own part, I am entirely satisfied that it is impossible to root out the present evils in the Netherlands by force, without shaking the state from its foundation. I conclude with reminding you of what we have all heard frequently, That the Protestants in the Low Countries have opened a correspondence with those in France. Let us beware of irritating them more than we have already done, lest, by imitating the French Catholics in their severity, we, like them, involve our country in the dreadful miseries of a civil war."
The regent finding that her situation become every day more critical, informed the king of it, who immediately sent the Duke of Alva, a nobleman of the most imperious character, tyrannical and vindictive in the extreme, to execute his pleasure in the Netherlands, armed with full power to punish or to pardon crimes of every sort. He began his administration with publishing a declaration, that a month should be allowed to the reformers for preparing to leave the country, without receiving, during that space, any trouble or molestation, and at the same time he issued secret orders to the inquisitors to proceed immediately in the execution of their edicts with the utmost rigor. To assist and encourage these men in the exercise of their office, he instituted a new council, to which he gave the name of the Council of Tumults, which he appointed to take cognizance of the late disorders, and to search after and punish all those who had been concerned, directly or indirectly, in promoting them. This council consisted of twelve persons, the greatest part of whom were Spaniards. The duke was the president himself, and in his absence Vargas, a Spanish lawyer, distinguished above all his countrymen by his avarice and cruelty. One of the first deeds of this tribunal, which might well be called, as the Flemings termed it, the Council of Blood, was to declare, That to have presented or subscribed any petition against the late erection of bishoprics, or against the edicts or Inquisition, or to have permitted the exercise of the new religion under any pretense whatever; or to insinuate by word of mouth or writing, that the king has no right to abolish those pretended privileges which have been the source of so much impiety, is treason against the king, and justly merits the severest punishment he shall be pleased to inflict.
The governor had already stationed his army in such a manner as he thought would most effectually secure the execution of this cruel, undistinguishing resolution of the council. In Antwerp he built a citadel, and compelled the inhabitants to defray the expense which this instrument of their own slavery had cost him. He began to build citadels in other places: and, in the mean time, he spread his troops over the country in such formidable bodies, that the people, over whom they exercised the most oppressive tyranny, either forsook their habitations, or gave themselves up to despair. Above twenty thousand persons escaped, at this time, into France, England, and the Protestant provinces of Germany. Great numbers were prevented from flying, and seized whilst they were meditating flight, by the cruel hand of the persecutor. The innocent were overwhelmed with horror at the sight of the dreadful punishments inflicted on the guilty; and lamented at this once flourishing country, so much distinguished for the mildness of its government and the happiness of its people, should now present no other object to view, but confiscations, imprisonments, and blood.
There was no distinction made of age, sex, or condition. Persons in their earliest youth; persons worn out, and ready to sink under the infirmities of age; persons of the highest rank, as well as the lowest of the people, on the slightest evidence, and sometimes even on bare suspicion, were alike sacrificed to the rapacity and cruelty of the governor and his associates. Although in the space of a few months upwards of eighteen hundred persons suffered by the hand of the executioner; yet the Duke of Alva’s thirst of blood was not satiated. Prisoners were not brought in so fast, nor seized in such considerable numbers, as he desired. The time of Carnival was approaching, when he expected that he should find the reformers off their guard. They would then leave their skulking-places, he supposed, and visit their families, while the Catholics were immersed in mirth and dissipation. On this occasion his soldiers, accompanied by the inquisitors, like so many wolves, were let loose among the Protestants; who were seized in the middle of the night in their beds, and from thence dragged to prisons and dungeons.
Many who had been only once present at the protestant assemblies, even although they declared their faith in the catholic religion to be firm and unshaken, were hanged or drowned: while those who professed themselves to be Protestants, or refused to abjure their religion, were put to the rack, in order to make them discover their associates; they were then dragged by horses to the place of execution, and their bodies being committed to the flames, their sufferings were prolonged with ingenious cruelty.
To prevent them from bearing testimony, in the midst of their torments, to the truth of their profession, their executioners were not satisfied with barely confining their tongues; they first scorched them with a glowing iron, and then screwed them into a machine, contrived on purpose to produce the most excruciating pain.
It is shocking to recount the numberless instances of inhuman cruelty perpetrated by Alva and his associates, especially when we consider that the unhappy victims were not those hardened wretches, who, by daring and bloody deeds, are guilty of violating the laws of nature and humanity, but were generally persons of the most inoffensive characters; who, having imbibed the new opinions in religion, had too much probity to disguise their sentiments; or, at the worst, had been betrayed into indiscretions by their zeal for propagating truths, which they believed to be of the highest importance to the glory of God and the happiness of men.
Alva communicated a great share of his savage spirit to the inferior magistrates; who knew that they could not recommend themselves more effectually either to the king or to the governor, than by the exercise of rigor and severity. Several of them, however, whose humanity prevailed over the considerations of safety and interest, were induced to give the Protestants timely warning to withdraw. Even the members of the bloody council began to feel their hearts revolt against the reiterated instances of cruelty, to which their sanction was required. Some of them applied for dismission; others had the courage to absent themselves; and out of the twelve, of which the council was composed, there were seldom above three or four present.
About this time the magistrates of Antwerp, whose behavior, from the beginning of Alva’s administration, had been extremely obsequious, thought they might venture to interpose in favor of certain citizens whom the inquisitors had imprisoned. Their petition was conceived in the humblest terms; and they represented, that although the persons for whom they pleaded had been present two or three times in the Protestant assemblies, yet it was only curiosity that had led them thither; they were still true sons of the church, and faithful subjects to the king; and they had remained in the country till the time of their imprisonment, on the faith of the declaration which the governor had made, that they should not receive any disturbance on account of what had passed, till the expiration of a month after his arrival in the Netherlands.
To this petition Alva haughtily replied, that he was amazed at their folly in presuming to apply to him in behalf of heretics; and they should have reason, he added, to repent bitterly of their conduct, if they did not act more prudently in future; for they might rest assured, that he would hang them all, for an example to deter others from the like presumption. Notwithstanding this, some of the catholic nobility, and Viglius, who had formerly concurred in all the arbitrary measures of Granvelle, but whose heart melted at the present misery of his countrymen, had the courage to remonstrate to the king against the governor’s barbarity. Even the pope exhorted him to greater moderation. Philip, however, refused to countermand the orders which he had given, till he should hear from Vargas; who advised him to persevere in the plan which he had adopted, assured him of its success, and at the same time flattered him with the hopes of an inexhaustible fund of wealth that would arise from confiscation. Vargas being seconded by the inquisitors at Madrid, Philip lent a deaf ear to the remonstrance which had been made to him, and the persecutions were continued with the same unrelenting fury as before. The people of the Netherlands were confirmed in their despair of obtaining mercy from Philip, by the accounts transmitted to them at this time from Spain, of his cruel treatment of his son Don Carlos. Various relations are given of that tragical and mysterious affair by the contemporary historians; but the following appears the most consistent and probable. This young prince had from his earliest youth been noted for the impetuosity and violence of his temper; and though he never gave reason to think favorably of his understanding, or his capacity for government, he had discovered the most intemperate ambition to be admitted by his father to a share in the administration of his dominions. Philip, whether from jealousy, or a conviction of his son’s unfitness for any important trust, refused to gratify his ambition, he behaved towards him with distance and reserve, while he gave all his confidence to the Duke of Alva, Ruy Gomez de Sylva, and the president Spinosa; against whom Don Carlos, partly on this account, and partly because he considered them as spies upon his conduct, had conceived the most irreconcilable aversion. In this disposition he did not scruple, on different occasions, to censure the measures of his father’s government and particularly those which had been adopted in the Netherlands. He had sometimes expressed his compassion for the people there; had threatened the Duke of Alva, and even made an attempt upon his life, for accepting the government; had been suspected of holding secret interviews with the Marquis of Mons, and the Baron de Montigny; and had afterwards formed the design of retiring into the Netherlands, with an intention to put himself at the head of the malcontents.
Of this design intelligence was carried, by some of the courtiers, to the king; who after having consulted with the inquisitors, at Madrid, as he usually did in matters of great importance and difficulty, resolved to prevent the prince from putting his scheme into execution, by depriving him of his liberty. For this purpose he went into his chamber in the middle of the night, attended by some of his privy counselors and guards: and, after reproaching him with his undutiful behavior, told him that he had come to exercise his paternal correction and chastisement. Then having dismissed all his attendants, he commanded him to be clothed in a dark colored mourning dress, and appointed guards to watch over him, and to confine him to his chamber. The high spirited young prince was extremely shocked at such unworthy treatment, and prayed his father and his attendants to put an immediate end to his life. He threw himself headlong into the fire, and would have put an end to his life had he not been prevented by the guards. During his confinement, his despair and anguish rose to a degree of frenzy. He would fast sometimes for whole days together, then eat voraciously, and endeavor to choke himself by swallowing his victuals without chewing. Several princes interceded for his release, as did many of the principal Spanish nobles. But his father was relentless and inexorable. After six months’ imprisonment, he caused the Inquisition of Madrid to pass sentence against his son, and under the cover of that sentence, ordered poison to be given him, which in a few hours put a period to his miserable life, at the age of twenty-three.
Philip had, before this time, given a proof of the cruelty of his disposition; when, as above related, he chose to be present at the execution of his protestant subjects in Spain. His singular conduct on that occasion, and the composure with which he beheld the torments of the unhappy sufferers, were ascribed by some to the power of superstition: while they were regarded by others, as the most convincing evidence of the sincerity of his zeal for the true religion. But his severity towards his son did not admit of any such interpretation. It was considered by all the world as a proof that his heart was dead to the sentiments of natural affection and humanity; and his subjects were everywhere filled with astonishment. It struck terror in a particular manner, into the inhabitants of the Low Countries; who saw how vain it was to expect mercy from a prince, who had so obstinately refused to exercise it towards his own son; whose only crime, they believed, was his attachment to them, and his compassion of their calamities. [Watson’s History of Philip II, volume 1, book 8.]