acrilegious Outrages.--Alarm at
Brussels.--Churches granted to Reformers.--Margaret repents her
Concessions.--Feeling at Madrid.--Sagacity of Orange.--His Religious
Opinions.

1566.

While Philip was thus tardily coming to concessions which even then were
not sincere, an important crisis had arrived in the affairs of the
Netherlands. In the earlier stages of the troubles, all orders, the
nobles, the commons, even the regent, had united in the desire to
obtain the removal of certain abuses, especially the Inquisition and the
edicts. But this movement, in which the Catholic joined with the
Protestant, had far less reference to the interests of religion than to
the personal rights of the individual. Under the protection thus
afforded, however, the Reformation struck deep root in the soil. It
nourished still more under the favor shown to it by the confederates,
who, as we have seen, did not scruple to guaranty security of religions
worship to some of the sectaries who demanded it.

But the element which contributed most to the success of the new
religion was the public preachings. These in the Netherlands were what
the Jacobin clubs were in France, or the secret societies in Germany and
Italy,--an obvious means for bringing together such as were pledged to a
common hostility to existing institutions, and thus affording them an
opportunity for consulting on their grievances, and for concerting the
best means of redress. The direct object of these meetings, it is true,
was to listen to the teachings of the minister. But that functionary,
far from confining himself to spiritual exercises, usually wandered to
more exciting themes, as the corruptions of the Church and the condition
of the land. He rarely failed to descant on the forlorn circumstances of
himself and his flock, condemned thus stealthily to herd together like a
band of outlaws, with ropes, as it were, about their necks, and to seek
out some solitary spot in which to glorify the Lord, while their
enemies, in all the pride of a dominant religion, could offer up their
devotions openly and without fear, in magnificent temples. The preacher
inveighed bitterly against the richly benefited clergy of the rival
Church, whose lives of pampered ease too often furnished an indifferent
commentary on the doctrines they inculcated. His wrath was kindled by
the pompous ceremonial of the Church of Rome, so dazzling and attractive
to its votaries, but which the Reformer sourly