ians, he would inevitably raise against
himself a storm of obloquy in our island. He knew by experience what it
was to govern two nations strongly attached to two different Churches. A
large party among the Episcopalians of England could not forgive him
for having consented to the establishment of the presbyterian polity in
Scotland. A large party among the Presbyterians of Scotland blamed him
for maintaining the episcopal polity in England. If he now took under
his protection masses, processions, graven images, friaries, nunneries,
and, worst of all, Jesuit pulpits, Jesuit confessionals and Jesuit
colleges, what could he expect but that England and Scotland would join
in one cry of reprobation? He therefore refused to accept the government
of the Low Countries, and proposed that it should be entrusted to the
Elector of Bavaria. The Elector of Bavaria was, after the Emperor, the
most powerful of the Roman Catholic potentates of Germany. He was young,
brave, and ambitious of military distinction. The Spanish Court was
willing to appoint him, and he was desirous to be appointed; but much
delay was caused by an absurd difficulty. The Elector thought it beneath
him to ask for what he wished to have. The formalists of the Cabinet of
Madrid thought it beneath the dignity of the Catholic King to give what
had not been asked. Mediation was necessary, and was at last successful.
But much time was lost; and the spring was far advanced before the new
Governor of the Netherlands entered on his functions. [300]

William had saved the coalition from the danger of perishing by
disunion. But by no remonstrance, by no entreaty, by no bribe, could
he prevail on his allies to be early in the field. They ought to have
profited by the severe lesson which had been given them in the preceding
year. But again every one of them lingered, and wondered why the rest
were lingering; and again he who singly wielded the whole power of
France was found, as his haughty motto had long boasted, a match for
a multitude of adversaries. [301] His enemies, while still unready,
learned with dismay that he had taken the field in person at the head of
his nobility. On no occasion had that gallant aristocracy appeared with
more splendour in his train. A single circumstance may suffice to give
a notion of the pomp and luxury of his camp. Among the musketeers of his
household rode, for the first time, a stripling of seventeen, who soon
afterwards succeeded to the t