themselves as to the two Powers allied with them: they
thought that the articles of the treaty had been drawn up by the
former, but devised and dictated by the latter. It was their serious
intention that this agreement should be only temporary; they reckoned
upon the speedy death of the King of France, and upon future troubles
in England, for an opportunity of resuming the war.[345] But whatever
the future might bring to pass, England, as well as France, derived an
incalculable advantage at the time from the erection of an independent
state under their protection, which could not but ally itself with
them against the still dominant power of Spain.

[Sidenote: A.D. 1610.]

On the whole the general understanding which King James maintained
with Henry IV secured a support for his State, and imparted to himself
a political courage which was otherwise foreign to his nature. The two
sovereigns also made common cause in the Cleves-Juliers question. Two
Protestant princes with the consent of the Estates had taken
possession of it on the strength of their hereditary title. When an
Archduke laid hands on the principal fortress in the country, a
general feeling of jealousy was roused: and even in England it was
thought that the point at issue here was not the possession of a small
principality, but the confirmation of the House of Austria and the
Papacy in their already tottering dominion over these provinces of the
Lower Rhine, which might exercise such an important influence on the
State of Europe.[346] When Henry IV joined the German Union and the
Dutch for the protection of the two princes and for the conquest of
Juliers, James also decided to bestow his aid. He took into his own
pay 4000 of the troops who were still in the service of the Republic,
sent them a general, and despatched them to the contested dominions to
take part in the struggle.

It does not appear that any one in England was aware of the great
designs which Henry IV connected with this enterprise. When, on the
eve of its execution, he was struck down in the centre of his capital
by the dagger of a fanatic, friends and foes alike were thrilled with
the feeling that the event affected them all, and would have an
immeasurable influence on the world. In England also it was felt as a
domestic calamity. Robert Cecil, now Earl of Salisbury, said in
Parliament that Henry IV had been as it were their advanced guard
against conspiracies of which he had always given