males to take the vows at sixteen and females at
twelve. And while all the opinions of the Protestants were, without
exception, condemned, no indulgence was shown to their errors or
weaknesses, nor a single step taken to win them back by mildness to the
bosom of the mother church. Amongst the Protestants the wearisome
records of the subtle deliberations of the synod, and the absurdity of
its decisions, increased, if possible, the hearty contempt which they
had long entertained for popery, and laid open to their
controversialists new and hitherto unnoticed points of attack. It was
an ill-judged step to bring the mysteries of the church too close to the
glaring torch of reason, and to fight with syllogisms for the tenets of
a blind belief.

Moreover, the decrees of the Council of Trent were not satisfactory even
to all the powers in communion with Rome. France rejected them
entirely, both because she did not wish to displease the Huguenots, and
also because she was offended by the supremacy which the pope arrogated
to himself over the council; some of the Roman Catholic princes of
Germany likewise declared against it. Little, however, as Philip II.
was pleased with many of its articles, which trenched too closely upon
his own rights, for no monarch was ever more jealous of his prerogative;
highly as the pope's assumption of control over the council, and its
arbitrary, precipitate dissolution had offended him; just as was his
indignation at the slight which the pope had put upon his ambassador; he
nevertheless acknowledged the decrees of the synod, even in its present
form, because it favored his darling object--the extirpation of heresy.
Political considerations were all postponed to this one religious
object, and he commanded the publication and enforcement of its canons
throughout his dominions.

The spirit of revolt, which was diffused through the Belgian provinces,
scarcely required this new stimulus. There the minds of men were in a
ferment, and the character of the Romish Church had sunk almost to the
lowest point of contempt in the general opinion. Under such
circumstances the imperious and frequently injudicious decrees of the
council could not fail of being highly offensive; but Philip II. could
not belie his religious character so far as to allow a different
religion to a portion of his subjects, even though they might live on a
different soil and under different laws from the rest. The regent was
strictly en