The Life and Death of John of Barneveld, Advocate of Holland, 1609-10 | Page 2

Austria, Rome, Venice, and the Netherlands, and in many other
places. When out of them one day a complete and authentic narrative

shall have been constructed, it will be seen how completely the policy
of Charles foreshadowed and necessitated that of Philip, how logically,
under the successors of Philip, the Austrian dream of universal empire
ended in the shattering, in the minute subdivision, and the reduction to
a long impotence of that Germanic Empire which had really belonged
to Charles.
Unfortunately the great Republic which, notwithstanding the aid of
England on the one side and of France on the other, had withstood
almost single-handed the onslaughts of Spain, now allowed the demon
of religious hatred to enter into its body at the first epoch of peace,
although it had successfully exorcised the evil spirit during the long
and terrible war.
There can be no doubt whatever that the discords within the interior of
the Dutch Republic during the period of the Truce, and their tragic
catastrophe, had weakened her purpose and partially paralysed her arm.
When the noble Commonwealth went forward to the renewed and
general conflict which succeeded the concentrated one in which it had
been the chief actor, the effect of those misspent twelve years became
apparent.
Indeed the real continuity of the war was scarcely broken by the fitful,
armistice. The death of John of Cleve, an event almost simultaneous
with the conclusion of the Truce, seemed to those gifted with political
vision the necessary precursor of a new and more general war.
The secret correspondence of Barneveld shows the almost prophetic
accuracy with which he indicated the course of events and the approach
of an almost universal conflict, while that tragedy was still in the future,
and was to be enacted after he had been laid in his bloody grave. No
man then living was so accustomed as he was to sweep the political
horizon, and to estimate the signs and portents of the times. No
statesman was left in Europe during the epoch of the Twelve Years'
Truce to compare with him in experience, breadth of vision, political
tact, or administrative sagacity.
Imbued with the grand traditions and familiar with the great personages
of a most heroic epoch; the trusted friend or respected counsellor of
William the Silent, Henry IV., Elizabeth, and the sages and soldiers on
whom they leaned; having been employed during an already long
lifetime in the administration of greatest affairs, he stood alone after the

deaths of Henry of France and the second Cecil, and the retirement of
Sully, among the natural leaders of mankind.
To the England of Elizabeth, of Walsingham, Raleigh, and the Cecils,
had succeeded the Great Britain of James, with his Carrs and Carletons,
Nauntons, Lakes, and Winwoods. France, widowed of Henry and
waiting for Richelieu, lay in the clutches of Concini's, Epernons, and
Bouillons, bound hand and foot to Spain. Germany, falling from
Rudolph to Matthias, saw Styrian Ferdinand in the background ready to
shatter the fabric of a hundred years of attempted Reformation. In the
Republic of the Netherlands were the great soldier and the only
remaining statesman of the age. At a moment when the breathing space
had been agreed upon before the conflict should be renewed; on a
wider field than ever, between Spanish-Austrian world-empire and
independence of the nations; between the ancient and only Church and
the spirit of religious Equality; between popular Right and royal and
sacerdotal Despotism; it would have been desirable that the soldier and
the statesman should stand side by side, and that the fortunate
Confederacy, gifted with two such champions and placed by its own
achievements at the very head of the great party of resistance, should be
true to herself.
These volumes contain a slight and rapid sketch of Barneveld's career
up to the point at which the Twelve Years' Truce with Spain was signed
in the year 1609. In previous works the Author has attempted to assign
the great Advocate's place as part and parcel of history during the
continuance of the War for Independence. During the period of the
Truce he will be found the central figure. The history of Europe,
especially of the Netherlands, Britain, France, and Germany, cannot be
thoroughly appreciated without a knowledge of the designs, the labours,
and the fate of Barneveld.
The materials for estimating his character and judging his judges lie in
the national archives of the land of which he was so long the foremost
citizen. But they have not long been accessible. The letters, state papers,
and other documents remain unprinted, and have rarely been read. M.
van Deventer has published three most interesting volumes of the
Advocate's correspondence, but they reach only to the beginning of
1609. He has suspended his labours exactly at the moment when