His wife's uncle, the landgrave of Hesse,
pressed him publicly to avow his belief. To this the prince objected,
that he should thus become the open enemy of the Catholics, and probably
lose his influence with the Calvinists, already too well disposed to
acts of violence.[869] Yet not long after we find William inquiring of
the landgrave if it would not be well to advise the king, in terms as
little offensive as possible, of his change of religion, asking the
royal permission at the same time, to conform his worship to it.[870]

William's father had been a Lutheran, and in that faith had lived and
died. In that faith he had educated his son. When only eleven years old,
the latter, as we have seen, was received into the imperial household.
The plastic mind of boyhood readily took its impressions from those
around, and without much difficulty, or indeed examination, William
conformed to the creed fashionable at the court of Castile. In this
faith--if so it should be called--the prince remained during the
lifetime of the emperor. Then came the troubles of the Netherlands; and
William's mind yielded to other influences. He saw the workings of
Catholicism under a terrible aspect. He beheld his countrymen dragged
from their firesides, driven into exile, thrown into dungeons, burned at
the stake; and all this for no other cause than dissent from the dogmas
of the Romish Church. His soul sickened at these enormities, and his
indignation kindled at this invasion of the inalienable right of private
judgment. Thus deeply interested for the oppressed Protestants, it was
natural that William should feel a sympathy for their cause. His wife
too was of the Lutheran persuasion. So was his mother, still surviving.
So were his brothers and sisters, and indeed all those nearest akin to
him. Under these influences, public and domestic, it was not strange,
that he should have been led to review the grounds of his own belief;
that he should have gradually turned to the faith of his parents,--the
faith in which he had been nurtured in childhood.[871] At what precise
period the change in his opinions took place we are not informed. But
his letter to the landgrave of Hesse, in November, 1566, affords, so far
as I am aware, the earliest evidence that exists, under his own hand,
that he had embraced the doctrines of the Reformation.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE REGENT'S AUTHORITY REESTABLISHED.

Reaction.--Appeal to Arms.--Tumult in Antwerp.--Sieg