in respect of its Bishoprick His Majesty demands likewise that Long-Wic and its Provostship be quitted to him but offereth withall to recompense the Prince of Lorrain with another provostship of equal value within one of the three Bishopricks And whereas Marsal having been quitted to his Majesty by a particular Treaty is not at present any part of Lorrain so it is not to be understood to be comprised in this restitution These are the Terms which may and ought to make the Platform of a General Peace and upon which his Majesty hath long ago declared himself to the King of Great Britain His Majesty desires that they may be imparted to the Assembly at Nimeguen and that his own Plenipotentiaries there propose them to the consideration of the rest as containing the lowest Conditions that he can admit and upon which his Enemies may make choice either of War or Peace Given at St. Germans the 9th day of April 1678. His Majesties Letter to the States General of the United Provinces Written from the Camp at Deinse the 18th of May 1678. Most dear great Friends Allies and Confederates OUt of the sincere affection which we have always born to the promoting of the Peace of Europe we are very much satisfi'd to understand by our Plenipotentiaries at Nimeguen the account given unto them in your name by one of your Ambassadors concerning your thoughts upon the conclusion of so great a Work which you had imparted to them by one of your Ambassadors We are glad to understand that the terms which we proposed at that Assembly appear to you to be reasonable and that you are fully perswaded of the sincerity of our mind in a matter of so great importance And it is with the greater fatissaction to our selves that we confirm the same unto you by this Letter because notwithstanding those advantages which we have already acquir'd by our Arms and may justly hope for by the prosecution of the War yet we place our chiefest glory in making all the steps we can towards a Peace But because it appears by the Discourses that have been made to our Plenipotentiaries by your order that how desirous soever you are to conclude the Peace yet there remains some scruple with you concerning the Seventh Article of the Treaty of Commerce which has been debated at Nimeguen between our Ambassadors and yours and trouble of mind lest we should make an entire Conquest of the Low-Countreys in case Spain should reject the Terms we have offered we are willing to impart our thoughts unto you upon those two Points We cannot do it more favourably as to the first of them than by granting that the Seventh Article should be as your selves desire it And in taking such measures with you upon the second Point as may ease you of the fear you express for the loss of Flanders And this we will then do when Spain having refused to consent to the Peace there shall be a Treaty concluded between us and you upon such Terms as have been already propos'd with relation to your selves and that you shall have returned to our Alliance and shall oblige your selves to continue Neuters during the War We shall be always ready for your sakes to grant to Spain the same Terms with relation to Flanders which they are at liberty now to accept And we are further willing to assure you that in all that time we will not Attaque any one Place in those Provinces Thus you shall always find us readily inclined not onely to form that Bar which you think so necessary for your own safety but to secure it and to let you enjoy together with the re-establishment of Commerce whatever other advantages you can expect from our Friendship And if for the prosecuting this Negotiation you shall think it necessary to send Deputies to us they will find us near Ghent till the 27th day of this Month and in the same dispositions we have declared to you in this Letter In the mean time we pray God to take you most dear great Friends Allies and Confederates into his holy protection Given at our Camp at Deinse the 18th day of May 1678. Your good Friend Allie and Confederate LOUIS Underneath was Signed Arnauld A Letter from the States General of the United Provinces to the Most Christian King Written from the Hague the 25th of May 1678. To his Most Christian Majesty SIR WE received with great respect the Letter which your Majesty did us the honour to write to us and were transported with an excess of joy to understand thereby your Majesties unfeigned desire to promote the peace of Europe and that your Majesty places your chiefest glory in making all the steps that may conduce to the effecting a matter of so great importance Sir we think our selves obliged to return your Majesty our most humble thanks and we have thought fit for this purpose to send to your Majesty the Sieur Beverning Baron of Teylingham one of our Ambassadours Extraordinary and Plenipotentiaries at the Treaty of Peace at Nimeguen in quality of our Ambassadour Extraordinary to acquaint your Majesty with our earnest desire to give your Majest◠〈◊〉 assurances of our Sincere intentions for thâ—â—â—â—d Peace and we hope your Majesty will grant him a favourable Audience and give all credit to him as a Person throughly acquainted with our resolution ever to remain Sir Your Majesties Most Humble Servants the States General of the United Provinces of the Low Countreys The Kings answer to the Letter of the States General of the Unitedd Provinces Written at the Camp at Wetter the first day of June 1678. MOst dear great Friends Allies and Confederates We have with much pleasure understood as by the Letter you writ us so by the Assurances which the Heer Van Beverning your Extraordinary Ambassador hath in your Name given us the dispositions in which you profess your selves to be to a Peace We cannot let you better know how firm and sincere our intentions are to procure so great and so general a good for Europe than by the Writing which we have commanded to be put into his hands You will see the new Facilities we offer to put you in a state to bring your Allies to consent to the conditions which we cannot doubt but you judge equitable And having nothing farther to add thereunto We onely assure you of the satisfaction we shall have in giving you back with the Peace our old and real friendship and in entring with you into the strongest and most capable Engagements for securing ever your Liberty which we have more amply explained our selves upon to the Heer Van Beverning whose Conduct and Person hath been very acceptable to us There remains onely That we pray God to have you Most dear great Friends Allies and Confederates in his holy keeping Given in our Camp at Wetteren the first day of June 1678. Your good Friend Allie and Confederate LOUIS Underneath was Signed Arnauld The Memorial which the King
of the United Provinces of the Low Countrys The King's Answer to the Letter of the States General of the United Provinces written from St. Germain the 30th of June 1678. Most Dear Great Friends Allies and Confederates You will easily judge after all that we have done toward the Facilitating of a Peace that we were very well satisfied to understand by your Letter that before the time which we had agreed to allow for a Cessation of Arms you had sent instructions to your Plenipotentiary Ambassador at Nemiguen to Sign the Treaty of Peace before the end of this month And by the assurance which you give us that at the same time those of the Catholick King will accept of it we see your inclinations are well disposed toward the general quiet of Europe We Promise our selves likewise that it cannot be long retarded by those of your Allies that hitherto notwithstanding all the good Offices which you have done towards it refuse to joyn with you in the procuring so great a good and so universally desired In the mean time as the Peace which we doubt not but will immediately be concluded with you at Nimeguen since we have your word for it puts us into a condition of rendring you our entire affection of which we take delight in letting you feel the effects we are willing at your desire from hence forward to surcease all acts of hostility to the Low Countreys and whatever obstruction our Men of War or Privateers may give to your Commerce Common usage would require that things should continue in the same posture they now are till the Peace were fully consummated by exchange of the Ratifications and publication of Treaties but without staying till they that are now to be Signed betwixt our Plenipotentiaries Ambassadors at Nimeguen those of the Catholick King and yours shall be come to our hands out of our respect to you we will send order immediately to the Duke of Luxemburg to retire our Army from about Brussells into that part of the Country that is now under our subjection We will charge him to concert upon this subject with the Duke De Villa Hermosa and even with your Envoy there and to settle some regulation for those Officers to be under that shall command the Troops which we are obliged to leave about Mons and on what manner they may continue without any acts of hostility on either side but in a good understanding and so as the country may be open till the Ratifications are exchanged with Spain Having thus quieted all things at Land we are willing at your instance to do the same by Sea The Treaty which Our Ambassadors must Sign with Yours will ascertain the Places and Times within which what ever shall be taken on either side shall be deemed lawful Prize But for the present security of such Vessels as shall Sail out of your Ports whether for Trade or Fishing we think good to send a competent number of Passports to our Ambassadors at Nimeguen whom we will order to deliver them to Yours as there shall be occasion They shall do the same to the Ambassador of Spain But upon this condition that when the Ambassador of the Catholick King and your Ambassador shall receive them they shall be obliged at the same time to put into my Ambassadors hands such quantities of Passports as they shall demand of them We are well satisfied in not suffering more tedious forms though ordinarily observed in Treaties of Peace to impair the benefit that ought to accrew to your people by this and in letting them tast the sweetness of Peace from this very time and in procuring the same ease to those of the Catholick King for your Sakes You may see by this new testimony of our Friendship that we retain the same good disposition towards your Common-Wealth which our Predecessors have had who did so much toward the Raising of it and which we hope will help to render it more happy and flourishing for the future We pray God to take you Most Dear Great Friends Allies and Confederates into his Holy Protection Written at St. Germain in Laye the 30th of June 1678. Your Good Friend Allie and Confederate LOUIS Underneath was Signed Arnauld Extract of the Resolution of their Lordships the States of Holland and Friesland at their meeting on the 11th of July 1678. THe Pensionary Fagel has shown to the Assembly a Letter of the 10th of this instant from the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary at the Treaty of Peace at Nimeguen written to himself importing that the Ambassadours of France have declared to them that the King their Master is not minded to Evacuate Mastricht nor the other places of the Bar till a compleat satisfaction be made to the King of Sweden Where upon deliberation we have thought fit that this matter be put in as from the States aforesaid to the States General to the end that answer may be returned to the Ambassadors of the States that it could not be believed nor expected that his Most Christian Majesty would have made the least difficulty in the Evacuation of those places after the Peace Signed concluded and ratified betwixt his Most Christian Majesty and Spain and this State and that the States could not foresee that there would arise any new obstructions or difficulties on his Most Christian Majesti's part after he had given them himself and by his Ministers so many assurances of his unfeigned inclinations not only to a general Peace but particularly to a Peace with this State It is very true that when his Mejesty compos'd a general platform for us to take our measures by it was put down in the first Article that his Majesty would never listen to any Terms of Peace other than such as should give the King of Sweden full and compleat satisfaction and his Majesty might with good reason insrst upon it and take care to have it effected if we had been able to dispose the Confederates to accept the conditions of that Project But since the Confederates did not think it their interests to make Peace upon those terms as the States foresaw at first they would not and that his Catholick Majesty would make some scruple as the Ambassadors of the State intimated to those of France desiring them to let them know what places the King their Master intended should make the Bar in the Spanish Netherlands and his Most Christian Majesty was pleased to assure the States by a Letter of the 18th of May written from his Camp in case his Catholick Majesty should refuse the Peace upon the said Terms and that the States would conclude their Treaty and oblige themselves to remain neuters that then his Majesty would always be willing to grant to Spain the conditions of the Project and promised not to lay Siege to any place in the Spanish Netherlands during the whole War without making any mention of Sweden or the rest of the Confederates Whereupon their Lordships the States
Ordered to be delivered to the Sieur Van Beverning Ambassador Extraordinary from the States General of the United Provinces to his Majesty THe King hath with pleasure seen as by the Letter of the Heeren the States General so by the Assurances which they have given him by the Heer Van Beverning their Extraordinary Ambassador that their Intentions to a General Peace correspond with the desire his Majesty hath had to procure the same and that they are ready to accept the Conditions which his Majesty hath offered them by his Ambassadors and Plenipotentaries at Nimeguen But at the same time that the Heer Van Beverning hath thus made known to him the Sentiments of the said States General he hath in their Name prayed his Majesty would grant a Cessation of Arms for six Weeks and hath represented to him that they had need of that time to communicate with their Allies and to obtain their consent for the concluding of so great a work The condition in which his Majesties Arms are at present and the favourable opportunity that would be lost in deferring their acting would not permit him to consent to this Proposal if the desire to give Peace to Europe did not much more prevail in him than that of enlarging his Frontiers by new Conquests It is in this consideration to contribute to the Publick Repose that he will agree at the desire of the said States General to a Cessation of Arms for six weeks to begin the first day of the next month such an one as was stipulated between France and Spain in the year 1668. But forasmuch as it would not be just if the Enemies of His Majesty should let that time pass fruitlesly and that instead of its serving to advance the Peace they should make advanttge thereof to avoid the effect of his Majesties Arms that he should have lost the advantageous conjuncture which is at present in his hand His Majesty desires of the said States General that they do promise him in case during the time of the said Cessation of Arms they cannot bring their Allies to accept the conditions which he hath offered They will not assist them directly or indirectly against him or against his Allies during the whole course of the War In exchange his Majesty will in such case renew to them the same Engagements which he hath taken with them by his Letter of the 18 of the last Month as well for what concerns the same Conditions which he will be always ready to agree to Spain as for the security of the Places in the Netherlands His Majesty hath thought fit to make known to the said States General by this Memorial which he hath appointed to be delivered to the Heer Van Beverning the sincerity of his intentions for a Peace And to give them a yet far greater testimony thereof he doth command the Duke of Luxemburg General of his Army to go and expect their Answer during this Month in the Neighbourhood af Brussels with orders not to Attaque any Place during that time Given in the Camp at Wetteren the first day of June 1678. Signed LOUIS And underneath Arnauld The Memorial of the Deputies Extraordinary of the States General c. to the Duke De Villa Hermosa of the 27th of May. THe Lords the States General of the United Provinces are extremely satisfi'd to understand by the Answer your Excellency was pleased to return to the Memorial presented on their behalf by us their under-written Deputies Extraordinary the 14th instant That your Excellency did agree and consented to treat of a Truce or Cessation of Arms for the space of six weeks and could have wished That you had as positively declared your self touching the second Point contained in the said Memorial namely the Conditions of Peace proposed some time ago by the Ambassadors and Plenipotentiaries of the King of France at Nimeguen But because in the said Answer no mention is made of so considerable a Point their Hi. and Mi. have again commanded us to make instance and represent unto your Excellency of how great moment it is as well with relation to the common Cause as more especially for the preservation of what remains to his Catholick Majesty in the Low Countreys that your Excellency declare in the name of the King of Spain your acceptance of the said Conditions of Peace such as they are considering the present state of affairs and the risque and great danger there may be in continuing the War against so powerful an Enemy as the King of France is who has already brought his Army together and is himself at the head of it in the Field and that in the heart of the Low Countreys For these and other reasons represented in the preceding Memorials we earnestly entreat your Excellency to take such a resolution as may be agreeable to the desires of our Lords and Masters and that without loss of time since a few days considering the condition wherein things are at present may produce fatal Revolutions and such as would extremely embarass as well your Excellency as the Allies and be likewise very prejudicial to the Peace of all Europe Done at Bruxels the 27th of May 1678. Jacob Boreal De Weede A Declaration given by the Spaniards containing their consent to the Conditions proposed by his Majesty in order to a Peace HIs Excellency having seen and considered this Memorial and at the same time made particular reflection upon the former ones of the 8th and the 14th of May though the States General of the United Provinces know very well that the terms upon which the King of France has offered to make Peace with Spain are very hard yet considering the misfortune and extremities that the Low-Countreys are exposed to and that their Hi. and Mi. though otherwise so much concerned also in the Interest of their preservation do yet find themselves at present deprived of all means to effect it their People not being in condition to carry on the War and considering that in this Juncture of Affairs nothing can be of so great importance as the preservation of that miserable Remainder of Flanders by strict Alliances which they persuade us to accept of and value And whereas in the said Memorial the States General do represent their instances of and desire to admit of the said Conditions in order to the conclusion of a Peace his Excellency being willing to second them as he hath done from the very first time that his Master entred into the War which he undertook first for the preservation of the Confederates Estates of the Low-Countreys and has since continued to assert the common Interest is now likewise willing to comply with the desire of the States General and to admit of a Peace upon such terms as the King of France hath propos'd to the end that so convincing a proof of his Excellencies servent desire to unite him with the said States General may contribute to strengthen their mutual Alliances and conduce to the