The Revolt of The Netherlands, book 4 | Page 4

take the images out
of the churches, as had been done in the other towns. If they were not
opposed it should be done quietly and with as little injury as possible,
but otherwise they would storm the churches;" nay, they went so far in
their audacity as to ask the aid of the officers of justice therein. At first
the magistrate was astounded at this demand; upon reflection, however,
and in the hope that the presence of the officers of law would perhaps
restrain their excesses, he did not scruple to grant their request.
In Tournay the churches were despoiled of their ornaments within sight
of the garrison, who could not be induced to march against the
Iconoclasts. As the latter had been told that the gold and silver vessels
and other ornaments of the church were buried underground, they
turned up the whole floor, and exposed, among others, the body of the
Duke Adolph of Gueldres, who fell in battle at the head of the
rebellious burghers of Ghent, and had been buried herein Tournay. This
Adolph had waged war against his father, and had dragged the
vanquished old man some miles barefoot to prison--an indignity which
Charles the Bold afterwards retaliated on him. And now, again, after
more than half a century fate avenged a crime against nature by another
against religion; fanaticism was to desecrate that which was holy in
order to expose once more to execration the bones of a parricide. Other
Iconoclasts from Valenciennes united themselves with those of
Tournay to despoil all the cloisters of the surrounding district, during
which a valuable library, the accumulation of centuries, was destroyed
by fire. The evil soon penetrated into Brabant, also Malines,
Herzogenbusch, Breda, and Bergen-op-Zoom experienced the same

fate. The provinces, Namur and Luxemburg, with a part of Artois and
of Hainault, had alone the good fortune to escape the contagion of those
outrages. In the short period of four or five days four hundred cloisters
were plundered in Brabant and Flanders alone.
The northern Netherlands were soon seized with the same mania which
had raged so violently through the southern. The Dutch towns,
Amsterdam, Leyden, and Gravenhaag, had the alternative of either
voluntarily stripping their churches of their ornaments, or of seeing
them violently torn from there; the determination of their magistrates
saved Delft, Haarlem, Gouda, and Rotterdam from the devastation. The
same acts of violence were practised also in the islands of Zealand; the
town of Utrecht and many places in Overyssel and Groningen suffered
the same storms. Friesland was protected by the Count of Aremberg,
and Gueldres by the Count of Megen from a like fate. An exaggerated
report of these disturbances which came in from the provinces spread
the alarm to Brussels, where the regent had just made preparations for
an extraordinary session of the council of state. Swarms of Iconoclasts
already penetrated into Brabant; and the metropolis, where they were
certain of powerful support, was threatened by them with a renewal of
the same atrocities then under the very eyes of majesty. The regent, in
fear for her personal safety, which, even in the heart of the country,
surrounded by provincial governors and Knights of the Fleece, she
fancied insecure, was already meditating a flight to Mons, in Hainault,
which town the Duke of Arschot held for her as a place of refuge, that
she might not be driven to any undignified concession by falling into
the power of the Iconoclasts. In vain did the knights pledge life and
blood for her safety, and urgently beseech her not to expose them to
disgrace by so dishonorable a flight, as though they were wanting in
courage or zeal to protect their princess; to no purpose did the town of
Brussels itself supplicate her not to abandon them in this extremity, and
vainly did the council of state make the most impressive
representations that so pusillanimous a step would not fail to encourage
still more the insolence of the rebels; she remained immovable in this
desperate condition. As messenger after messenger arrived to warn her
that the Iconoclasts were advancing against the metropolis, she issued
orders to hold everything in readiness for her flight, which was to take
place quietly with the first approach of morning. At break of day the

aged Viglius presented himself before her, whom, with the view of
gratifying the nobles, she had been long accustomed to neglect. He
demanded to know the meaning of the preparations he observed, upon
which she at last confessed that she intended to make her escape, and
assured him that he would himself do well to secure his own safety by
accompanying her. "It is now two years," said the old man to her, "that
you might have anticipated these results. Because I have