History of the United Netherlands, 1608b | Page 5

revolt of these five provinces against the union might be
at any moment expected, ill disposed as they were to recognise a

sovereignty which abolished their religion." Being himself a Catholic,
however, it was not unnatural that he should make a different deduction
from that of the prince, and warmly recommend, not more garrisons,
but more liberty of worship.
Thus the very men who were ready to dare all, and to sacrifice all in
behalf of their country, really believed themselves providing for the
imperishable security of the commonwealth by placing it on the narrow
basis of religious intolerance.
Maurice, not satisfied with making these vehement arguments against
the truce in his conferences with the envoys of the French and British
sovereigns, employed the brief interval yet to elapse before definitely
breaking off or resuming the conferences with the Spanish
commissioners in making vigorous appeals to the country.
"The weal or woe of the United Provinces for all time," he said, "is
depending on the present transactions." Weigh well the reasons we urge,
and make use of those which seem to you convincing. You know that
the foe, according to his old deceitful manner, laid down very specious
conditions at the beginning, in order to induce my lords the States-
General to treat.
"If the king and the archdudes sincerely mean to relinquish absolutely
their pretensions to these provinces, they can certainly have no
difficulty in finding honest and convenient words to express their
intention. As they are seeking other phrases than the usual and
straightforward ones, they give certain proof that they mean to keep
back from us the substance. They are trying to cheat us with dark,
dubious, loosely-screwed terms, which secure nothing and bind to
nothing. If it be wise to trust the welfare of our State to ambiguous
words, you can judge according to your own discretion.
"Recognition of our sovereignty is the foundation-stone of these
negotiations.
"Let every man be assured that, with such mighty enemies, we can do
nothing by halves. We cannot afford to retract, mutilate, or moderate
our original determination. He who swerves from the straight road at
the beginning is lost; he who stumbles at the first step is apt to fall
down the whole staircase. If, on account of imaginable necessity, we
postpone that most vital point, the assurance of our freedom, we shall
very easily allow less important points to pass muster, and at last come

tamely into the path of reconciliation. That was exactly the danger
which our ancestors in similar negotiations always feared, and against
which we too have always done our best to guard ourselves.
"Wherefore, if the preservation of our beloved fatherland is dear to you,
I exhort you to maintain that great fundamental resolution, at all times
and against all men, even if this should cause the departure of the
enemy's commissioners. What can you expect from them but evil
fruit?"
He then advised all the estates and magistracies which he was
addressing to instruct their deputies, at the approaching session of the
States- General, to hold on to the first article of the often-cited
preliminary resolution without allowing one syllable to be altered.
Otherwise nothing could save the commonwealth from dire and
notorious confusion. Above all, he entreated them to act in entire
harmony and confidence with himself and his cousin, even as they had
ever done with his illustrious father.
Certainly the prince fully deserved the confidence of the States, as well
for his own signal services and chivalrous self-devotion, as for the
unexampled sacrifices and achievements of William the Silent. His
words had the true patriotic ring of his father's frequent and eloquent
appeals; and I have not hesitated to give these extracts from his
discourse, because comparatively few of such utterances of Maurice
have been preserved, and because it gives a vivid impression of the
condition of the republic and the state of parties at that momentous
epoch. It was not merely the fate of the United Netherlands and the
question of peace or war between the little republic and its hereditary
enemy that were upon the issue. The peace of all Christendom, the
most considerable material interests of civilization, and the highest
political and moral principles that can influence human action, were
involved in those negotiations.
There were not wanting many to impeach the purity of the stadholder's
motives. As admiral or captain-general, he received high salaries,
besides a tenth part of all prize-money gained at sea by the fleets, or of
ransom and blackmail on land by the armies of the republic. His
profession, his ambition, his delights, were those of a soldier. As a
soldier in a great war, he was more necessary to his countrymen than he
could expect to be as a statesman in time of peace.