ee
states left the chamber. A solitary individual from Holland remained
however, a burgomaster of Amsterdam.

Uytenbogaert, conversing with Barneveld directly afterwards, advised him
to accept the vote. Yielding to the decision of the majority, it would be
possible, so thought the clergyman, for the great statesman so to handle
matters as to mould the Synod to his will, even as he had so long
controlled the States-Provincial and the States-General.

"If you are willing to give away the rights of the land," said the
Advocate very sharply, "I am not."

Probably the priest's tactics might have proved more adroit than the
stony opposition on which Barneveld was resolved.

But it was with the aged statesman a matter of principle, not of policy.
His character and his personal pride, the dignity of opinion and office,
his respect for constitutional law, were all at stake.

Shallow observers considered the struggle now taking place as a personal
one. Lovers of personal government chose to look upon the Advocate's
party as a faction inspired with an envious resolve to clip the wings of
the Stadholder, who was at last flying above their heads.

There could be no doubt of the bitter animosity between the two men.
There could be no doubt that jealousy was playing the part which that
master passion will ever play in all the affairs of life. But there could
be no doubt either that a difference of principle as wide as the world
separated the two antagonists.

Even so keen an observer as Dudley Carleton, while admitting the man's
intellectual power and unequalled services, could see nothing in the
Advocate's present course but prejudice, obstinacy, and the insanity of
pride. "He doth no whit spare himself in pains nor faint in his
resolution," said the Envoy, "wherein notwithstanding he will in all
appearance succumb ere afore long, having the disadvantages of a weak
body, a weak party, and a weak cause." But Carleton hated Barneveld, and
considered it the chief object of his mission to destroy him, if he
could. In so doing he would best carry out the wishes of his sovereign.

The King of Britain had addressed a somewhat equivocal letter to the
States-General on the subject of religion in the spring of 1617. It
certainly was far from being as satisfactory as, the epistles of 1613
prepared under the Advocate's instructions, had been, while the exuberant
commentary upon the royal text, delivered in full assembly by his
ambassado