affecting
instances are recorded of persons who, with no support but their trust
in heaven, displayed the most heroic fortitude in the presence of their
judges, and, by the boldness with which they asserted their opinions,
seemed even to court the crown of martyrdom. On the scaffold and at the
stake this intrepid spirit did not desert them; and the testimony they
bore to the truth of the cause for which they suffered had such an
effect on the bystanders, that it was found necessary to silence them. A
cruel device for more effectually accomplishing this was employed by the
officials. The tip of the tongue was seared with a red-hot iron, and the
swollen member then compressed between two plates of metal screwed fast
together. Thus gagged, the groans of the wretched sufferer found vent in
strange sounds, that excited the brutal merriment of his
tormentors.[1067]

But it is needless to dwell longer on the miseries endured by the people
of the Netherlands in this season of trial. Yet, if the cruelties
perpetrated in the name of religion are most degrading to humanity, they
must be allowed to have called forth the most sublime spectacle which
humanity can present,--that of the martyr offering up his life on the
altar of principle.

It is difficult--in fact, from the data in my possession, not
possible--to calculate the number of those who fell by the hand of the
executioner in this dismal persecution.[1068] The number, doubtless, was
not great as compared with the population of the country,--not so great
as we may find left, almost every year of our lives, on a single
battle-field. When the forms of legal proceedings are maintained, the
movements of justice--if the name can be so profaned--are comparatively
tardy. It is only, as in the French Revolution, when thousands are swept
down by the cannon, or whole cargoes of wretched victims are plunged at
once into the waters, that death moves on with the gigantic stride of
pestilence and war.

[Sidenote: CONFISCATIONS.]

But the amount of suffering from such a persecution is not to be
estimated merely by the number of those who have actually suffered
death, when the fear of death hung like a naked sword over every man's
head. Alva had expressed to Philip the wish that every man, as he lay
down at night, or as he rose in the morning, "might feel that his house,
at any hour, might fall and crush him!"[1069] This humane wish was
accomplished. Those who escaped death had to fear