h the active
life of Charles V. had accumulated, and had deposited in the mind of this
man, made him indispensable to his successor. Self-sufficient as the
latter was, and accustomeded to confide in his own understanding, his
timid and crouching policy was fain to lean on a superior mind, and to
aid its own irresolution not only by precedent but also by the influence
and example of another. No political matter which concerned the royal
interest, even when Philip himself was in the Netherlands, was decided
without the intervention of Granvella; and when the king embarked for
Spain he made the new regent the same valuable present of the minister
which he himself had received from the Emperor, his father.

Common as it is for despotic princes to bestow unlimited confidence on
the creatures whom they have raised from the dust, and of whose
greatness they themselves are, in a measure, the creators, the present
is no ordinary instance; pre-eminent must have been the qualities which
could so far conquer the selfish reserve of such a character as Philip's
as to gain his confidence, nay, even to win him into familiarity. The
slightest ebullition of the most allowable self-respect, which might
have tempted him to assert, however slightly, his claim to any idea
which the king had once ennobled as his own, would have cost him his
whole influence. He might gratify without restraint the lowest passions
of voluptuousness, of rapacity, and of revenge, but the only one in
which he really took delight, the sweet consciousness of his own
superiority and power, he was constrained carefully to conceal from the
suspicious glance of the despot. He voluntarily disclaimed all the
eminent qualities, which were already his own, in order, as it were, to
receive them a second time from the generosity of the king. His
happiness seemed to flow from no other source, no other person could
have a claim upon his gratitude. The purple, which was sent to him from
Rome, was not assumed until the royal permission reached him from Spain;
by laying it down on the steps of the throne he appeared, in a measure,
to receive it first from the hands of majesty. Less politic, Alva
erected a trophy in Antwerp, and inscribed his own name under the
victory, which he had won as the servant of the crown--but Alva carried
with him to the grave the displeasure of his master. He had invaded
with audacious hand the royal prerogative by drawing immediately at the
fountain of i