fficult to
wage war with such immortal hate as the Netherlands had waged it, no
doubt the spirit of republican and even democratic liberty lay hidden
within that rigid husk, but it was dishonour to the martyrs who had died
by thousands at the stake and on the battle field for the rights of
conscience if the only result of their mighty warfare against wrong had
been to substitute a new dogma for an old one, to stifle for ever the
right of free enquiry, theological criticism, and the hope of further
light from on high, and to proclaim it a libel on the Republic that
within its borders all heretics, whether Arminian or Papist, were safe
from the death penalty or even from bodily punishment. A theological
union instead of a national one and obtained too at the sacrifice of
written law and immemorial tradition, a congress in which clerical
deputations from all the provinces and from foreign nations should
prescribe to all Netherlanders an immutable creed and a shadowy
constitution, were not the true remedies for the evils of confederacy,
nor, if they had been, was the time an appropriate one for their
application.

It was far too early in the world's history to hope for such
redistribution of powers and such a modification of the social compact as
would place in separate spheres the Church and the State, double the
sanctions and the consolations of religion by removing it from the
pollutions of political warfare, and give freedom to individual
conscience by securing it from the interference of government.

It is melancholy to see the Republic thus perversely occupying its
energies. It is melancholy to see the great soldier becoming gradually
more ardent for battle with Barneveld and Uytenbogaert than with Spinola
and Bucquoy, against whom he had won so many imperishable laurels. It is
still sadder to see the man who had been selected by Henry IV. as the one
statesman of Europe to whom he could confide his great projects for the
pacification of Christendom, and on whom he could depend for counsel and
support in schemes which, however fantastic in some of their details, had
for their object to prevent the very European war of religion against
which Barneveld had been struggling, now reduced to defend himself
against suspicion hourly darkening and hatred growing daily more insane.

The eagle glance and restless wing, which had swept the whole political
atmosphere, now caged within the stifling limits of theological casuistry