CHAPTER VII

PHILIP II AND THE REVOLT OF THE NETHERLANDS AGAINST SPANISH RULE (1555-96)

The revolt of the Netherlands against Spain is not merely an event of local Belgian history; it belongs to the political history of Europe. It is an episode of those long and cruel wars of religion which, beginning in Scotland after the constitution of the first Presbyterian Covenant, set aflame the whole of Western Europe. Of course, the occasion for the wars differed in each country, but the cause was the same in every case and the question which was to be supreme in Europe, Catholicism or Protestantism, actuated them all. In this tremendous struggle all questions were finally reduced to one, and as social influences aligned themselves on one side or the other, the tide turned in favor of or against the church. Catholics and Protestants supported their brethren in the faith on the other side of the frontiers. Each side sought a decisive victory; divided influence or co-ordinate recognition was acceptable to neither. Timid persons and politicians seeking to remain neutral were carried away by the current or submerged by it. Neutrality was impossible; everyone was forced to take part in the struggle.

The kings of France, lacking principles and decision, found their own forces divided and were unable to carry out a real international policy. On the other hand, Elizabeth, Queen of England, resolutely ranged herself on the side of international Protestantism, assisting and often directing its attacks. Against her, Philip II of Spain, considering himself as the absolute defender of Catholicism in Europe, set his nationality and his faith. Lacking decision in political matters, he showed no indecision in matters of faith. Against him arose the league of Protestants throughout Europe. They realized that, if he was defeated and his country crushed, the church would be defeated throughout the world. The Protestants therefore concentrated their attack on him in the Netherlands. The geographical position of the latter made interference with England, France, and Germany especially feasible; but they were at the same time the weakest spots in Philip’s dominions. Revolt blazed within their borders--such revolt as might result in bringing his power to an end. This Philip realized full well, and determined to go to any limit in order to keep the Netherlands. Nothing was left undone which would serve to suppress every attempt at revolt. This object it was which dictated his unhappy policy in the Netherlands, a policy that resulted in the loss of the northern part, and ultimately in the founding of the separate state of the United Provinces (Holland).

The true meaning of the wars of religion in the Netherlands cannot be properly understood without taking these considerations into account. It will also be useful to consider the characters of those prominently involved in the tragedy, before narrating the details of the tragedy itself.

Philip II, King of Spain and sovereign of the Netherlands, was above all a Spaniard. Educated in Spain, he found himself unable to understand the Belgians as his father had. He did not appreciate their pride, their deep love of liberty, and their respect for the privileges granted them. An autocratic king, he was haughty as only a Spaniard can be. Deeply convinced of the superiority of Catholicism, and possessing principles absolutely rigid in character, he was incapable of compromise--in short, a real bigot. In political affairs he endeavored to arrange every detail himself, and personally to read piles of dispatches by the light of a candle in his dark room in the Escurial. He labored day and night, constantly immersed in thought, and was remarkably slow in reaching a decision. When, however, his mind was finally made up, it was usually too late. Events had progressed in the meantime and when his orders reached the theater of war they could not be carried out, since the situation had entirely changed. That slowness of decision brought him many disasters. Nevertheless, he was an excellent father to his children, and there are extant letters written by him to his daughters, in which it is difficult to recognize the lonely thinker of the Escurial.

He paid a short visit to his subjects in the Netherlands at the beginning of his reign (1557), but left no sympathetic impression behind. His sister, Duchess Margareta of Parma, remained in the country to govern the people during his absence. He was absent to the end. His Flemish subjects never saw him again. From Madrid he directed the affairs of the Belgians, and studied the dispatches which reached him every week.

Margareta, offspring of the amour of Emperor Charles V with the daughter of a Flemish upholsterer from Audenaerde, had been educated for a time in Brussels and had then gone to Italy, where she successively married Alessandro de’ Medici and Ottavio Farnese, the latter being Duke of Parma and Piacenza. Although of masculine character, loving sport and exercises, Margareta possessed the feminine characteristics of vanity and shrewdness. She had acquired in Italy a disposition to engage in _combinazione_, and succeeded in playing the game often under very difficult circumstances. Philip of Spain left her as an assistant in her political councils a man of real diplomacy, Cardinal de Granvelle.

Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, Burgundian in origin, was a loyal servant of his master. He was the man of the _raison d’état_. Philip II never had a more faithful minister. Granvelle desired only the welfare of the King and of the state he represented, and was heroic enough to assume the responsibility for the drastic measures taken by his sovereign. He was a man of real political genius, clear-sighted, absolutely unselfish. The main object of his political plans was that Spain should rule the seas, and it was he who urged Philip II to send the famous Armada against England.

When Philip II began his reign in the Netherlands, the financial situation of the government was distressing. Charles V had left heavy debts created by his numerous wars. Public opinion was defiant, influenced as it was by ill will for the unsympathetic King and by the baseless fear that the scheme of erecting new dioceses would be the precursor of the terrible Spanish Inquisition.

The scheme of erecting new dioceses had been conceived by the King in 1559, in order to counteract more strongly the propaganda of Protestantism. The existing mediaeval dioceses were too large to enable the bishops to carry out their mission as guardians of the faith. It was necessary, therefore, that the old dioceses be broken up and divided into smaller ones, so that the bishops would have more opportunity for action in smaller areas. The Pope consented, and permitted the erection of thirteen new dioceses. From an ecclesiastical point of view the country was now divided as follows: the archbishopric of Malines, with the suffragan dioceses, Antwerp, Bois-le-Duc, Ghent, Ypres, Bruges, Ruremonde; the archbishopric of Cambrai, with the suffragans, Arras, Tournai, Namur, Saint-Omer; the archbishopric of Utrecht, with the suffragans, Haerlem, Deventer, Leeuwarden, Middelburg, Groninge. The scheme stirred up violent opposition among the Belgian nobles, the abbots, some of the bishops, and even among the common people. The nobles feared the loss of their political influence through the admission of so many bishops into the States-General, where they would occupy leading positions. Many of the abbots were resentful because their monasteries would be compelled to contribute to the new bishops a part of their income, in support of the new dioceses. Some of the bishops were angered over the division of their former dioceses and the reduction of their spiritual power. The people, influenced by political agents and Protestant propagandists, were led to believe that each new bishop would simply be a representative of the Spanish Inquisition.

The movement of opposition would have been easily repressed by the Belgian nobles had they really been faithful to the King. But, on the whole, they were not. They had the same feelings as the French aristocracy at this time. They were horrified at the idea of the supremacy of the sovereign power. Although not possessing any definite aim, they tried to dominate the Prince and the state by means of the political power they themselves controlled. They were members of the Council of State, governors of the different Belgian provinces, captains in the national army, the famous _bandes d’ordonnance_, and they exercised a tremendous influence on all classes. The political difficulties encountered by the government were for them but favorable opportunities of which to take advantage. The King himself afforded them a chance. With characteristic disregard for the national privileges, he established at Brussels a council called the _Consulta_, an institution of true Spanish type. Composed of a few individuals, it was dominated by the influence of Cardinal de Granvelle, and undertook to decide the most important questions of national policy. The _Consulta_ stirred up an opposition of formidable character, guided by the most influential Belgian nobles, the Prince of Orange and the counts of Egmont and Horn. Cardinal de Granvelle became the victim of the most violent attacks. Margareta of Parma first sought to defend him, but, little by little, influenced by the nobles, she finally ranged herself on their side and herself requested the King to recall the unsympathetic minister. Partly through weariness, partly through political miscalculation, Philip II yielded. Granvelle left the Netherlands.

This was a triumph for the opposition. Margareta, who had been moved by jealousy of Granvelle and who had hoped to add materially to her power after his departure, fell more and more under the control of the nobles, who flattered her and took advantage of her feminine vanity. A reign of anarchy and favoritism followed, the friends of the nobles being furnished with offices and perquisites. The political opponents of the King now tried to consolidate and to perpetuate their success. They asked that all affairs be subject to the control of the Council of State, the real national body of which they themselves were the masters; that he should convoke the States-General, and that he should temper the _placarts_ against the heretics and abolish the power of the Inquisitors. The granting of the first of these demands would have made the nobles all-powerful in political affairs. From the second measure--the meeting of the States-General--they expected ratification of their conduct and popular support of the opposition they had inaugurated. In dealing with the question of the _placarts_, they played a sort of religious policy calculated to bring them the support of the Lutherans and the Calvinists.

Philip II rejected their demands. Astonished by this resistance, which they did not expect after the capitulation of the King on the question of Granvelle, some of the Belgian nobles, and especially the Prince of Orange, succeeded in embroiling the Protestant sectarians in the struggle. The Calvinists, more warlike than the Lutherans, were more than ready to join the movement, owing to their hatred of the Catholic King of Spain. But, once begun, the movement became an irresistible one. Stirred up by their preachers and assisted by the worst elements of the populace, the Calvinists invaded the churches, smashed the statues of the saints, carried away the treasures, attacked the convents, and killed monks and priests (1566). The Belgian nobles, surprised by the revolt they had so imprudently initiated, were unable to stop it; rather they were submerged by the current. From this time onward the political anti-Spanish movement became a part of the general movement of the wars of religion. Many Catholics foresaw what would happen and deserted the cause, separating themselves from a revolt that was being directed as much against the church as against Spanish rule.

From the revolt of 1566 and the outrages of the sectarians resulted the later policy of Philip II toward the Netherlands. Hitherto he had but followed the traditional policy of his father, Emperor Charles. He had showed respect for political institutions; he had avoided any cause of rupture. He had tried, of course unwillingly and unskilfully, to satisfy public opinion. His patience brought him nothing but a serious check. He had recalled, in 1561, the Spanish garrisons which had been quartered in Belgium during the war with France; he had sacrificed his loyal minister Granvelle and had capitulated to the nobles. But the more he showed himself to be conciliatory the more audacious became the opposition. This was at first purely political and aimed only at the reconstruction of the Burgundian state as against the Spanish state; later, it had dared to claim liberty of conscience, an unheard-of thing at this period; finally, it had favored the Calvinistic agitation and had caused the desecration of convents and churches.

When the news of this outrage reached the King, he angrily exclaimed: “By the soul of my father, for these crimes they shall pay a heavy price.” In the eyes of Philip II, official protector of Catholicism, both the royal and the divine majesty had been insulted, and the claim for autonomy had but aggravated the triumph of heresy. His rebellious subjects were to be chastised. He would impose political absolutism upon them as well as the religious control that prevailed in Spain. The iron rule he intended to introduce would preserve for the church and for himself those countries which were the cornerstones of his world-power.

From now on we may speak of the “Spanish rule.” The traditionally lax policy of Emperor Charles was gone. The tyranny of Spain was destined to crush the Belgians. That task was intrusted to the Duke of Alva, who came to Belgium as governor in 1567. Don Luis Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva and Marquess of Soria, was a cold and implacable warrior. The greatness of his king was for him the greatness of Spain. He hated the Belgians, who had dared to ask for liberty of conscience, as much as he hated the heretics. He accomplished his terrible mission unwaveringly and remorselessly; his method of government was terror. Accustomed to fight the Moslem Moors of Spain, he knew only two weapons with which to crush the heretics--the sword and the stake. He wrote in one of his letters: “It is infinitely better to keep, by means of war, for God and for the King, an impoverished and even ruined country, than to keep it, without war, undamaged, for the devil and his partisans, the heretics.”

Such was the terrible warrior to whom Philip II intrusted a double task: to chastise the rebels and heretics and to subject the nation to the rule of Madrid. Alva arrived in Belgium with a large number of the best Spanish troops. Contrary to all customs in the free Netherlands, they were billeted in the cities. A fortress was ordered built at Antwerp. The counts of Egmont and Horn and the burgomaster of Antwerp were treacherously arrested and imprisoned. But the real leader of the opposition, the Prince of Orange, could not be taken. More clear-sighted than his friends, he had fled to Holland before the coming vengeance. In defiance of all national privileges, Alva established an extraordinary tribunal, which the people soon called the “Council of Blood”; that court of justice, established and conducted in a thoroughly revolutionary manner, condemned scores of people who were more or less guilty of revolt against the King. About two thousand victims were sentenced to death and executed. Only political crimes were taken into account, and the condemnation was followed by the confiscation of property--a remarkably remunerative operation for the Spanish treasure chest. Terror fell upon the Belgians. All who had engaged in the slightest degree in the revolt of 1566 fled to foreign countries; Lutherans and Calvinists, panic-stricken, left the Netherlands in large numbers.

Meanwhile the Prince of Orange had sought for help among the German Protestant princes; he gathered an army and invaded Belgium. He had expected a general revolt of the people against Alva at the first news of his campaign. But the soldiers of his army, merely hirelings, and many of them fanatical Protestants, pillaged churches and convents on their way; they disgusted the naturally religious populace of Belgium, and the campaign of William the Silent proved a complete failure. The prince was compelled to seek refuge in France, where he hoped to get help from Coligny and the French Huguenots.

[Illustration: ANTWERP The oldest part of the city, the Scheldt, and the Town Hall]

By way of reply to this misadventure of William the Silent came the execution of the counts of Egmont and Horn. The “Council of Blood” charged them with high treason and ordered them to be put to death, on the Place du Sablon, in the heart of Brussels. Their death stupefied the people and disheartened the nationalists. Both counts fell victims to the hatred of the terrible duke, for they were guilty only of weakness and imprudence--they never really were traitors to their sovereign. The Belgians always regarded them as martyrs for their country. Alva now proceeded to introduce into the Netherlands the features of the Spanish régime, while his condemnations continued. For the first time since 1561 the new bishops were able to occupy their bishoprics, the Catholic faith was everywhere re-established, the University of Louvain was visited in order to determine whether it was sufficiently orthodox, the Council of State was no more called together or given over to Spaniards. In order to secure supplies and money for his administration and to crush the country economically, Alva introduced unheard-of taxes, called the _centième, vingtième, et dixième denier_. This meant a permanent impost, which the Belgians had always stoutly resisted. A revolt broke out all over the country. What the appeals of William the Silent did not effect, the attack upon the people’s privileges and wealth did. The Prince of Orange cleverly took advantage of it, and, needing the help of the heretics to fight the enemy, gave the direction of the movement into the hands of the Calvinists. Meanwhile a storm of recrimination and complaints, among which the protests of the bishops and of the University of Louvain were not the weakest, reached Philip II. The King understood that he had gone to work the wrong way, and that the policy of terrorism had not brought him any real success. He changed his mind and recalled Alva. The terrible duke left Belgium pursued by the maledictions of the whole people.

His successor, Don Luis de Requesens, was a better man. The change in the King’s attitude was immediately revealed by the measures taken by the new governor. Requesens abolished the “Council of Blood,” proclaimed a general amnesty, and opened negotiations at Breda with the rebellious provinces. These negotiations failed, however, and the struggle continued on both sides with alternating successes and reverses. Requesens died suddenly in 1575, at a moment when the government was facing an appalling financial crisis. The Council of State immediately took over the regency, till the King should send a new governor.

The Prince of Orange, however, had decided that there should be no peace and that the revolutionary movement should be agitated as much as possible. He had completely gained the confidence of Holland and Zeeland, where he was the real master, and he planned to extend his control over the rest of the Seventeen Provinces. Deeply compromised as he was, any agreement with the King would mean disaster and the end of his plans, which aimed at the separation of the Belgian provinces from the Spanish monarchy. Owing to personal circumstances he had first endeavored to resist Philip II by legal means. During his exile and under the government of Alva he had gone farther and had planned a general revolt, and now that the milder attitude of the King threatened to win back some sympathy in Belgium, especially among the Catholics, he foresaw that only the most daring policy would save the revolutionary movement. Agents were therefore sent to the southern provinces to stir up the people against any attempt at conciliation. As a result of their intrigues, the members of the Council of State were arrested by a furious mob and imprisoned. By the time they were liberated they had fallen completely under the influence of the revolutionary leaders. The States-General were called together by the friendly members of the Council of State, and for nine years exercised the chief power in Belgium. It was during their government, which proved on the whole to be Catholic and loyalist, that the Spanish soldiers, deprived of their pay, arose and sacked the city of Antwerp, killing nearly seven thousand people. This event is known as the “Spanish Fury.”

This, of course, gave the anti-Spanish party an excellent chance. Under the pressure of William the Silent, the States-General met at Ghent in 1575, and out of their deliberations was born the famous “Pacification of Ghent.” This act was the work of the Prince of Orange, and was intended to reconcile Catholics and Protestants and to settle their religious differences, in order that they might be united in the political struggle against Spain. This attempt at establishing a “peace of religion” was unfortunately premature and provisional. The hostilities between Catholics and Protestants were suspended and religious tolerance was proclaimed; but in Holland and Zeeland, the political sphere of influence of the Prince of Orange, the Catholic worship was provisionally forbidden. The States-General would, it was promised, later on reconsider the whole problem and settle the religious differences definitely. This agreement was, of course, unfavorable to the Catholics, but union was temporarily restored.

Meanwhile Don Juan, the new Spanish governor, had been appointed by Philip II and had arrived in Belgium. Don Juan was the son of Charles V, and the celebrated victor over the Turks in the naval battle of Lepanto (1571). He had no sympathy for the Belgians and did not like the task which was intrusted to him. He attempted, of course, though against his convictions, to negotiate with the rebels, but failed. As we have seen, the Prince of Orange had determined that there should be no peace until his plans had been carried out. By surprising and occupying the fortress of Namur, contrary to the conventions but in order to obtain a stronghold for his protection, Don Juan played, as a matter of fact, into the hands of his enemies. Under the influence of William the Silent the States-General declared the governor a traitor to the country, and called upon Archduke Mathias, brother of Emperor Rodolphe, to be their new governor. Mathias became practically an instrument in the hands of the Prince of Orange, who was appointed as his lieutenant-general.

Now followed a period of anarchy and misrule. Germany, England, and France sent into Belgium a host of sectarians and adventurers; these aided the Calvinists in taking Brussels, Antwerp, and Ghent. Ghent became the center of a Calvinistic republic, where the leaders ruled by terror and began a rigorous persecution of the Catholics. It was now quite clear that the Protestants had gained the upper hand in the struggle and that the national revolt had turned into a war against Catholicism. In the midst of these troubles, Don Juan of Austria died at Bouges, near Namur (1578).

At this very moment, events of great importance took place. The Prince of Orange, contrary to the provisions of the Pacification of Ghent, had again endeavored to introduce a new “peace of religion,” which had for its object the introduction of Protestantism into the Belgian provinces other than Holland and Zeeland. The Protestant ministers rejected his proposal. What they wanted was not co-ordinate recognition of Catholicism and Protestantism, but the complete supremacy of their own religion. Seeing that his attempts brought about only discontent of both parties, Catholics and Protestants, William the Silent finally declared himself openly as a Calvinist (1578). His rupture with the Catholics was now complete.

This induced the southern provinces, where Catholicism was still in control, to withdraw their support and to reconcile themselves with the Spanish King. The sole motive of this decision was a religious one. There could be no talk of hostility between the Walloons of the south and the Flemings of the north. This was not a question of racial or linguistic difference. The people of Artois, Hainaut, and French Flanders were disgusted at the excesses committed by the Calvinists of Ghent and the position taken by William the Silent in religious matters. The Catholic spirit of Belgium, imposed on the country ever since the Middle Ages, weighed more strongly in their minds than their national hostility to the Spanish rule. Moreover, two other provinces which joined them--Namur and Luxemburg--had never taken part in the revolt. As we have seen, the province of Brabant, more independent than any other, and, since the fourteenth century, determined in its opposition to foreign interference, had taken the real leadership in the struggle against Spain.

The movement in the south in favor of a reconciliation with Philip II was an essentially popular movement. The nobles of Artois and Hainaut still wavered in their sympathies.[14] The clever policy of the new governor, Alexander Farnese, who succeeded Don Juan of Austria after the death of the latter (1578), overcame their last hesitation.[15]

Alexander Farnese was the son of Margareta of Parma, who had formerly governed the Netherlands. He was of a sympathetic nature, loyal, honest, but firm. He was one of the greatest warriors of his age, but at the same time, being an Italian prince, he distinguished himself as a very shrewd diplomat. At last Philip II had found the right man to govern the Netherlands. Alexander Farnese, highly approved by Cardinal de Granvelle--who at this time resided in Madrid--inaugurated a policy of mildness and conciliation that produced the happiest results. He induced the nobles of the southern provinces, and especially the Count of Lalaing, to abandon their scruples and to return to the service of the King. Both clever diplomacy and gifts and promises of large sums of money played a part in these achievements. From these negotiations resulted the Treaty of Arras (1579), concluded between the representatives of Artois, Hainaut, Luxemburg, Namur, and French Flanders and the new governor, as a consequence of which the southern provinces returned to the allegiance of Philip II. A concession made by Farnese was that the foreign troops, which had for so many years pillaged and ruined the country, should leave Belgium.

The Treaty of Arras resulted in the reconquest, without bloodshed, of the southern part of Belgium; it provoked a rupture between Catholics and Protestants, the separation of the Walloons and the Flemings, and crushed the plans of the Prince of Orange. Henceforth it would be no longer possible to unite the whole of Belgium against Spanish rule. William the Silent replied to the Treaty of Arras by the so-called Union of Utrecht (1579), whereby the northern provinces of the Netherlands united themselves in the common struggle and decided to carry on the revolt to ultimate victory. Slowly, but surely, the secession of Belgium from Holland was in progress.

The Prince of Orange, infuriated by the blow inflicted on his policy, now proclaimed the forfeiture by Philip II of the sovereignty of the Netherlands and offered the crown to the Duke of Anjou, brother of the French King Henry III (1584). He himself received the title of governor of Holland and Zeeland and remained the real leader of the union. Philip II replied by declaring the Prince an outlaw and putting a price on his head. Such an appeal to murder was common in the sixteenth century and was even supported by the teaching of many theorists; today it seems cruel and opposed to every principle of civilization. A man fanatical enough to fulfil the desire of the Spanish King was soon found. Balthazar Gérard treacherously assassinated the Prince of Orange at Delft, in 1584. So died the leader of the revolt of the Netherlands against Spain. He did not succeed in uniting the whole of Belgium against Philip II, but he initiated the United Provinces of Holland. The Dutch are right, therefore, in calling him the “Father of the Fatherland.”

Meanwhile, supported by the Catholic provinces, Alexander Farnese had successively reconquered all the Belgian cities and won an imperishable fame by the siege and conquest of Antwerp. Only Ostend resisted and could not be taken. It seemed now to be the turn of the north, and already the United Provinces were threatened with invasion, when the unwise policy of Philip II suddenly stopped the advance. The lonely autocrat of the Escurial had planned the invasion of England and the conquest of the throne of France, where Henry IV, a Protestant but the legitimate heir, was at war with the Catholic League. To these plans he sacrificed all the resources of Spain from 1587 to 1592 and forced Farnese to suspend his campaign in Flanders, to assist in the transport of troops for the invasion of England, and to aid with his army the League in France. Both enterprises failed utterly, the invasion of England by the defeat of the Spanish Armada, the conquest of the French throne by the final rally of the country to the support of Henry IV.

The obstinacy of Philip II caused the loss of the northern part of the Netherlands, which Farnese would probably have conquered. Alexander Farnese died in 1592 and at his death the Spanish King lost the best governor he had ever had in Belgium. The last years of the sixteenth century were unhappy years for the country. The long and bloody struggle had utterly ruined the land. The population had been reduced by at least 50 per cent; churches and civic buildings had been burned or severely damaged; trade and industry were in large part gone; Antwerp had lost its commerce, and thousands of people engaged in trade had fled to England, Germany, or Holland. Artistic and literary

## activity had come to a complete standstill; and the scientific center

of Belgium, the University of Louvain, barely escaped complete ruin.

But Belgium remained Catholic and subject to the Spanish branch of the Hapsburgs, while the United Provinces (of Holland), overwhelmingly Protestant, had in fact become an independent country. Henceforth Belgium and Holland went each its own way, and their history no longer records common interests, at least until the period of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands (1814).

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