The Revolt of The Netherlands, book 4

The Revolt of The Netherlands,
book 4

The Project Gutenberg EBook Revolt of Netherlands, by Schiller, Book
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Title: The Revolt of The Netherlands, Book IV.
Author: Frederich Schiller
Release Date: Oct, 2004 [EBook #6779] [Yes, we are more than one
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OF NETHERLANDS, BOOK IV. ***

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BOOK IV.
THE ICONOCLASTS.

The springs of this extraordinary occurrence are plainly not to be
sought for so far back as many historians affect to trace them. It is
certainly possible, and very probable, that the French Protestants did
industriously exert themselves to raise in the Netherlands a nursery for
their religion, and to prevent by all means in their power an amicable
adjustment of differences between their brethren in the faith in that
quarter and the King of Spain, in order to give that implacable foe of
their party enough to do in his own country. It is natural, therefore, to
suppose that their agents in the provinces left nothing undone to
encourage their oppressed brethren with daring hopes, to nourish their
animosity against the ruling church, and by exaggerating the oppression
under which they sighed to hurry them imperceptibly into illegal
courses. It is possible, too, that there were many among the
confederates who thought to help out their own lost cause by increasing
the number of their partners in guilt; who thought they could not
otherwise maintain the legal character of their league unless the
unfortunate results against which they had warned the king really came
to pass, and who hoped in the general guilt of all to conceal their own
individual criminality. It is, however, incredible that the outbreak of the
Iconoclasts was the fruit of a deliberate plan, preconcerted, as it is
alleged, at the convent of St. Truyen. It does not seem likely that in a
solemn assembly of so many nobles and warriors, of whom the greater
part were the adherents of popery, an individual should be found insane
enough to propose an act of positive infamy, which did not so much
injure any religious party in particular, as rather tread under foot all

respect for religion in general, and even all morality too, and which
could have been conceived only in the mind of the vilest reprobate.
Besides, this outrage was too sudden in its outbreak, too vehement in
its execution altogether, too monstrous to have been anything more
than the offspring of the moment in which it saw the light; it seemed to
flow so naturally from the circumstances which preceded it that it does
not require to be traced far back to remount to its origin.
A rude mob, consisting of the very dregs of the populace, made brutal
by harsh treatment, by sanguinary decrees which dogged them in every
town, scared from place to place and driven almost to despair, were
compelled to worship their God, and to hide like a work of darkness the
universal, sacred privilege of humanity. Before their eyes proudly rose
the temples of the dominant church, in which their haughty brethren
indulged in ease their magnificent devotion, while they themselves
were driven from the walls, expelled, too, by the weaker number
perhaps, and forced, here in the wild woods, under the burning heat of
noon, in disgraceful secrecy to worship the same God; cast out from
civil society into a state of nature, and reminded in one dread moment
of the rights of that state! The greater their superiority of numbers the
more unnatural did their lot appear; with wonder they perceive the truth.
The free heaven, the arms lying ready, the frenzy in their brains and
fury in their hearts combine to aid the suggestions of some preaching
fanatic; the occasion calls; no premeditation