he true
Christian religion and liberty of conscience and opinion. There must be
religion in the Republic, he had said, but that the war was carried on to
sustain the opinion of one doctor of divinity or another on--differential
points was something he had never heard of and could never believe. The
good citizens of the country had as much right to hold by Melancthon as
by Calvin or Beza. He knew that the first proclamations in regard to the
war declared it to be undertaken for freedom of conscience, and so to
his, own knowledge it had been always carried on.

He was asked if he had not promised during the Truce negotiations so to
direct matters that the Catholics with time might obtain public exercise
of their religion.

He replied that this was a notorious falsehood and calumny, adding that
it ill accorded with the proclamation against the Jesuits drawn up by
himself some years after the Truce. He furthermore stated that it was
chiefly by his direction that the discourse of President Jeannin--urging
on part of the French king that liberty of worship might be granted to
the Papists--was kept secret, copies of it not having been furnished even
to the commissioners of the Provinces.

His indignant denial of this charge, especially taken in connection with
his repeated assertions during the trial, that among the most patriotic
Netherlanders during and since the war were many adherents of the ancient
church, seems marvellously in contradiction with his frequent and most
earnest pleas for liberty of conscience. But it did not appear
contradictory even to his judges nor to any contemporary. His position
had always been that the civil authority of each province was supreme in
all matters political or ecclesiastical. The States-General, all the
provinces uniting in the vote, had invited the Catholic provinces on more
than one occasion to join the Union, promising that there should be no
interference on the part of any states or individuals with the internal
affairs religious or otherwise of the provinces accepting the invitation.
But it would have been a gross contradiction of his own principle if he
had promised so to direct matters that the Catholics should have public
right of worship in Holland where he knew that the civil authority was
sure to refuse it, or in any of the other six provinces in whose internal
affairs he had no voice whatever. He was opposed to all tyranny over
conscience, he would have done his utmost to