sion of religion.

Clearly the time for argument had passed. As Dudley Carleton observed,
men had been disputing 'pro aris' long enough. They would soon be
fighting 'pro focis.'

In pursuance of the policy laid down by the Sharp Resolution, the States
proceeded to assure themselves of the various cities of the province by
means of Waartgelders. They sent to the important seaport of Brielle and
demanded a new oath from the garrison. It was intimated that the Prince
would be soon coming there in person to make himself master of the place,
and advice was given to the magistrates to be beforehand with him. These
statements angered Maurice, and angered him the more because they
happened to be true. It was also charged that he was pursuing his
Leicestrian designs and meant to make himself, by such steps, sovereign
of the country. The name of Leicester being a byword of reproach ever
since that baffled noble had a generation before left the Provinces in
disgrace, it was a matter of course that such comparisons were
excessively exasperating. It was fresh enough too in men's memory that
the Earl in his Netherland career had affected sympathy with the
strictest denomination of religious reformers, and that the profligate
worldling and arrogant self-seeker had used the mask of religion to cover
flagitious ends. As it had indeed been the object of the party at the
head of which the Advocate had all his life acted to raise the youthful
Maurice to the stadholderate expressly to foil the plots of Leicester, it
could hardly fail to be unpalatable to Maurice to be now accused of
acting the part of Leicester.

He inveighed bitterly on the subject before the state council: The state
council, in a body, followed him to a meeting of the States-General. Here
the Stadholder made a vehement speech and demanded that the States of
Holland should rescind the "Sharp Resolution," and should desist from the
new oaths required from the soldiery. Barneveld, firm as a rock, met
these bitter denunciations. Speaking in the name of Holland, he repelled
the idea that the sovereign States of that province were responsible to
the state council or to the States-General either. He regretted, as all
regretted, the calumnies uttered against the Prince, but in times of such
intense excitement every conspicuous man was the mark of calumny.

The Stadholder warmly repudiated Leicestrian designs, and declared that
he had been always influenced by a desire to serve