ntly he employed five secretaries at one time, dictating to them
in different languages, of which he is said to have spoken seven. What
his penetrating mind had slowly matured acquired in his lips both force
and grace, and truth, set forth by his persuasive eloquence, irresistibly
carried away all hearers. He was tempted by none of the passions which
make slaves of most men. His integrity was incorruptible. With shrewd
penetration he saw through the disposition of his master, and could read
in his features his whole train of thought, and, as it were, the
approaching form in the shadow which outran it. With an artifice rich in
resources he came to the aid of Philip's more inactive mind, formed into
perfect thought his master's crude ideas while they yet hung on his lips,
and liberally allowed him the glory of the invention. Granvella
understood the difficult and useful art of depreciating his own talents;
of making his own genius the seeming slave of another; thus he ruled
while he concealed his sway. In this manner only could Philip II. be
governed. Content with a silent but real power, Granvella did not grasp
insatiably at new and outward marks of it, which with lesser minds are
ever the most coveted objects; but every new distinction seemed to sit
upon him as easily as the oldest. No wonder if such extraordinary
endowments had alone gained him the favor of his master; but a large and
valuable treasure of political secrets and experiences, which the active
life of Charles V. had accumulated, and had deposited in the mind of this
man, made him indispensable to his successor. Self-sufficient as the
latter was, and accustomeded to confide in his own understanding, his
timid and crouching policy was fain to lean on a superior mind, and to
aid its own irresolution not only by precedent but also by the influence
and example of another. No political matter which concerned the royal
interest, even when Philip himself was in the Netherlands, was decided
without the intervention of Granvella; and when the king embarked for
Spain he made the new regent the same valuable present of the minister
which he himself had received from the Emperor, his father.

Common as it is for despotic princes to bestow unlimited confidence on
the creatures whom they have raised from the dust, and of whose
greatness they themselves are, in a measure, the creators, the present
is no ordinary instance; pre-eminent must have been the qualities which
coul