e-breakers were abroad.

It requires no profound research to comprehend the impulse which
leads a horde of fanatics to the most monstrous excesses. That
the deeds of the iconoclasts arose from the spontaneous outburst
of mere vulgar fury, admits of no doubt. The aspersion which
would trace those deeds to the meeting of St. Trond, and fix
the infamy on the body of nobility there assembled, is scarcely
worthy of refutation. The very lowest of the people were the
actors as well as the authors of the outrages, which were at
once shocking to every friend of liberty, and injurious to that
sacred cause. Artois and western Flanders were the scenes of the
first exploits of the iconoclasts. A band of peasants, intermixed
with beggars and various other vagabonds, to the amount of about
three hundred, urged by fanaticism and those baser passions which
animate every lawless body of men, armed with hatchets, clubs, and
hammers, forced open the doors of some of the village churches
in the neighborhood of St. Omer, and tore down and destroyed not
only the images and relics of saints, but those very ornaments
which Christians of all sects hold sacred, and essential to the
most simple rites of religion.

The cities of Ypres, Lille, and other places of importance, were
soon subject to similar visitations; and the whole of Flanders
was in a few days ravaged by furious multitudes, whose frantic
energy spread terror and destruction on their route. Antwerp was
protected for a while by the presence of the Prince of Orange;
but an order from the stadtholderess having obliged him to repair
to Brussels, a few nights after his departure the celebrated
cathedral shared the fate of many a minor temple, and was utterly
pillaged. The blind fury of the spoilers was not confined to
the mere effigies which they considered the types of idolatry,
nor even to the pictures, the vases, the sixty-six altars, and
their richly wrought accessories; but it was equally fatal to the
splendid organ, which was considered the finest at that time in
existence. The rapidity and the order with which this torch-light
scene was acted, without a single accident among the numerous
doers, has excited the wonder of almost all its early historians.
One of them does not hesitate to ascribe the "miracle" to the
absolute agency of demons. For three days and nights these revolting
scenes were acted, and every church in the city shared the fate
of the cathedral, which next to St.