y. Believe and cause to be believed that his
Majesty's letters and Sir R. Winwood's propositions have been and shall
be well considered, and that I am working with all my strength to that
end. You know the constitution of our country, and can explain everything
for the best. Many pious and intelligent people in this State hold
themselves assured that his Majesty according to his royal exceeding
great wisdom, foresight, and affection for the welfare of this land will
not approve that his letters and Winwood's propositions should be
scattered by the press among the common people. Believe and cause to be
believed, to your best ability, that My Lords the States of Holland
desire to maintain the true Christian, Reformed religion as well in the
University of Leyden as in all their cities and villages. The only
dispute is on the high points of predestination and its adjuncts,
concerning which moderation and a more temperate teaching is furthered by
some amongst us. Many think that such is the edifying practice in
England. Pray have the kindness to send me the English Confession of the
year 1572, with the corrections and alterations up to this year."

But the fires were growing hotter, fanned especially by Flemish
ministers, a brotherhood of whom Barneveld had an especial distrust, and
who certainly felt great animosity to him. His moderate counsels were but
oil to the flames. He was already depicted by zealots and calumniators as
false to the Reformed creed.

"Be assured and assure others," he wrote again to Caron, "that in the
matter of religion I am, and by God's grace shall remain, what I ever
have been. Make the same assurances as to my son-in-law and brother. We
are not a little amazed that a few extraordinary Puritans, mostly
Flemings and Frisians, who but a short time ago had neither property nor
kindred in the country, and have now very little of either, and who have
given but slender proofs of constancy or service to the fatherland, could
through pretended zeal gain credit over there against men well proved in
all respects. We wonder the more because they are endeavouring, in
ecclesiastical matters at least, to usurp an extraordinary authority,
against which his Majesty, with very weighty reasons, has so many times
declared his opinion founded upon God's Word and upon all laws and
principles of justice."

It was Barneveld's practice on this as on subsequent occasions very
courteously to confute the King out of his o