uence on the destinies of
mankind. It was in this reign that the great battle of religious liberty
was begun; and the attention and personal presence of Charles were
necessarily demanded most in the country where that battle was to be
fought. But a small part of his life was passed in Spain, in comparison
with what he spent in other parts of his dominions. His early
attachments, his lasting sympathies, were with the people of the
Netherlands; for Flanders was the place of his birth. He spoke the
language of that country more fluently than the Castilian; although he
knew the various languages of his dominions so well, that he could
address his subjects from every quarter in their native dialect. In the
same manner, he could accommodate himself to their peculiar national
manners and tastes. But this flexibility was foreign to the genius of
the Spaniard. Charles brought nothing from Spain but a religious zeal,
amounting to bigotry, which took deep root in a melancholy temperament
inherited from his mother. His tastes were all Flemish. He introduced
the gorgeous ceremonial of the Burgundian court into his own palace, and
into the household of his son. He drew his most trusted and familiar
counsellors from Flanders; and this was one great cause of the troubles
which, at the beginning of his reign, distracted Castile. There was
little to gratify the pride of the Spaniard in the position which he
occupied at the imperial court. Charles regarded Spain chiefly for the
resources she afforded for carrying on his ambitious enterprises. When
he visited her, it was usually to draw supplies from the cortes. The
Spaniards understood this, and bore less affection to his person than to
many of their monarchs far inferior to him in the qualities for exciting
it. They hardly regarded him as one of the nation. There was, indeed,
nothing national in the reign of Charles. His most intimate relations
were with Germany; and as the Emperor Charles the Fifth of Germany, not
as King Charles the First of Spain, he was known in his own time, and
stands recorded on the pages of history.

[Sidenote: SPAIN UNDER CHARLES THE FIFTH.]

When Charles ascended the throne, at the beginning of the sixteenth
century, Europe may be said to have been much in the same condition, in
one respect, as she was at the beginning of the eighth. The Turk menaced
her on the east, in the same manner as the Arab had before menaced her
on the west. The hour seemed to be fast