well as of Protestantism that drove
England forward to a conflict with Philip of Spain. Spain was at this
moment the mightiest of European powers. The discoveries of Columbus had
given it the New World of the West; the conquests of Cortes and Pizarro
poured into its treasury the plunder of Mexico and Peru; its galleons
brought the rich produce of the Indies, their gold, their jewels, their
ingots of silver, to the harbour of Cadiz. To the New World the Spanish
king added the fairest and wealthiest portions of the Old; he was master
of Naples and Milan, the richest and most fertile districts of Italy; in
spite of revolt he was still lord of the busy provinces of the Low
Countries, of Flanders, the great manufacturing district of the time,
and of Antwerp, which had become the central mart for the commerce of
the world. His native kingdom, poor as it was, supplied him with the
steadiest and the most daring soldiers that Europe had seen since the
fall of the Roman Empire. The renown of the Spanish infantry had been
growing from the day when it flung off the onset of the French chivalry
on the field of Ravenna; and the Spanish generals stood without rivals
in their military skill, as they stood without rivals in their ruthless
cruelty.

[Sidenote: Philip.]

The whole too of this enormous power was massed in the hands of a
single man. Served as he was by able statesmen and subtle diplomatists,
Philip of Spain was his own sole minister; labouring day after day, like
a clerk, through the long years of his reign, amidst the papers which
crowded his closet; but resolute to let nothing pass without his
supervision, and to suffer nothing to be done save by his express
command. His scheme of rule differed widely from that of his father.
Charles had held the vast mass of his dominions by a purely personal
bond. He chose no capital, but moved ceaselessly from land to land; he
was a German in the Empire, a Spaniard in Castille, a Netherlander in
the Netherlands. But in the hands of Philip his father's heritage became
a Spanish realm. His capital was fixed at Madrid. The rest of his
dominions sank into provinces of Spain, to be governed by Spanish
viceroys, and subordinated to the policy and interests of a Spanish
minister. All local liberties, all varieties of administration, all
national differences were set aside for a monotonous despotism which was
wielded by Philip himself. It was his boast that everywhere in the vast
compass of