en led to victory.[494] To add to their restlessness, many of
these, as well as of the higher nobility, were embarrassed by debts
contracted in their campaigns, or by too ambitious expenditure at home,
especially in rivalry with the ostentatious Spaniard. "The Flemish
nobles," says a writer of the time, "were too many of them oppressed by
heavy debts and the payment of exorbitant interest. They spent twice as
much as they were worth on their palaces, furniture, troops of
retainers, costly liveries, their banquets and sumptuous entertainments
of every description,--in fine, in every form of luxury and superfluity
that could be devised. Thus discontent became prevalent through the
country, and men anxiously looked forward to some change."[495]

Still another element of discontent, and one that extended to all
classes, was antipathy to the Spaniards. It had not been easy to repress
this even under the rule of Charles the Fifth, who had shown such
manifest preference for his Flemish subjects. But now it was more
decidedly called out, under a monarch, whose sympathies lay altogether
on the side of their rivals. No doubt this popular sentiment is to be
explained partly by the contrast afforded by the characters of the two
nations, so great as hardly to afford a point of contact between them.
But it may be fairly charged, to a great extent, on the Spaniards
themselves, who, while they displayed many noble and magnanimous traits
at home, seemed desirous to exhibit only the repulsive side of their
character to the eye of the stranger. Cold and impenetrable, assuming an
arrogant tone of superiority over every other nation, in whatever land
it was their destiny to be cast, England, Italy, or the Netherlands, as
allies or as enemies, we find the Spaniards of that day equally
detested. Brought with them, as the people of the Netherlands were,
under a common sceptre, a spirit of comparison and rivalry grew up,
which induced a thousand causes of irritation.

The difficulty was still further increased by the condition of the
neighboring countries, where the minds of the inhabitants were now in
the highest state of fermentation in matters of religion. In short, the
atmosphere seemed everywhere to be in that highly electrified condition
which bodes the coming tempest. In this critical state of things, it was
clear that it was only by a most careful and considerate policy that
harmony could be maintained in the Netherlands; a policy manif