in uncertain Climates especially if improved by accidents of ill health or ill fortune But this is a Disease too refin'd for this Countrey and People Who are well when they are not ill and pleas'd when they are not troubled are content because they think little of it and seek their happiness in the common Eases and Commodities of Life or the encrease of Riches Not amusing themselves with the more speculative contrivances of Passion or refinements of Pleasure To conclude this Chapter Holland is a Countrey where the Earth is better than the Air and Profit more in request than Honour Where there is more Sense than Wit More good Nature than good Humour And more Wealth than Pleasure Where a man would chuse rather to travel than to live Shall find more things to observe than desire And more persons to esteem than to love But the same Qualities and Dispositions do not value a private man and a State nor make a Conversation agreeable and a Government great Nor is it unlikely that some very great King might make but a very ordinary private Gentleman and some very extraordinary Gentleman might be capable of making but a very mean Prince CHAP. V. Of their RELIGION I Intend not here to speak of Religion at all as a Divine but as a meer Secular man when I observe the occasions that seem to have establisht it in the Forms or with the Liberties wherewith it is now attended in the United Provinces I believe the Reformed Religion was introduced there as well as in England and the many other Countreys where it is profess'd by the operation of Divine Will and Providence And by the same I believe the Roman-Catholique was continued in France Where it seemed by the conspiring of so many Accidents in the beginnings of Charles the Ninth's Reign to be so near a change And whoever doubts this seems to question not only the Will but the Power of God Nor will it at all derogate from the Honour of a Religion to have been planted in a Countrey by Secular means or Civil Revolutions which have long since succeeded to those Miraculous Operations that made way for Christianity in the world 'T is enough that God Almighty infuses belief into the hearts of men or else ordains it to grow out of Religious Enquiries and Instructions And that wherever the generality of a Nation come by these means to be of a belief It is by the force of this concurrence introduced into the Government and becomes the Establisht Religion of That Countrey So was the Reformed Profession introduced into England Scotland Sueden Denmark Holland and many parts of Germany So was the Roman-Catholique restored in France and in Flanders where notwithstanding the great Concussions that were made in the Government by the Hugonots and the Gueuses yet they were never esteemed in either of those Countreys to amount further than the Seventh or Eighth part of the people And whosoever designs the change of Religion in a Countrey or Government by any other means than that of a general conversion of the people or the greatest part of them Designs all the Mischiefs to a Nation that use to usher in or attend the two greatest Distempers of a State Civil War or Tyranny Which are Violence Oppression Cruelty Rapine Intemperance Injustice and in short the miserable Effusion of Human Blood and the Confusion of all Laws Orders and Virtues among men Such Consequences as these I doubt are something more than the disputed Opinions of any man or any particular Assembly of men can be worth Since the great and general End of all Religion next to mens happiness hereafter is their happiness here As appears by the Commandments of God being the best and greatest Moral and Civil as well as Divine Precepts that have been given to a Nation And by the Rewards proposed to the Piety of the Jews throughout the Old Testament which were the Blessings of this life as Health length of Age number of Children Plenty Peace or Victory Now the way to our future happiness has been perpetually disputed throughout the World and must be left at last to the Impressions made upon every man's Belief and Conscience either by natural or supernatural Arguments and Means Which Impressions men may disguise or dissemble but no man can resist For Belief is no more in a man's power than his Stature or his Feature And he that tells me I must change my Opinion for his because 't is the truer and the better without other Arguments that have to me the force of conviction May as well tell me I must change my gray eyes for others like his that are black because these are lovelier or more in esteem He that tells me I must inform my self Has reason if I do it not But if I endeavour it all that I can and perhaps more than he ever did and yet still differ from him And he that it may be is idle will have me study on and inform my self better and so to the end of my life Then I easily understand what he means by informing Which is in short that I must do it till I come to be of his opinion If he that perhaps pursues his Pleasures or Interests as much or more than I do And allows me to have as good sense as he has in all other matters Tells me I should be of his opinion but that Passion or Interest blinds me Unless he can convince me how or where this lies He is but where he was Only pretends to know me better than I do my self who cannot imagine why I should not have as much care of my soul as he has of his A man that tells me my opinions are absurd or ridiculous impertinent or unreasonable because they differ from his seems to intend a Quarrel instead of a Dispute and calls me Fool or Mad-man with a little more circumstance Though perhaps I pass for one as well in my senses as he as pertinent in talk and as prudent in life Yet these are the common Civilities in Religious Argument of sufficient and conceited men Who talk much of Right Reason and mean always their own And make their private imagination the measure of general Truth But such language determines all between us and the Dispute comes to end in three words at last which it might as well have ended in at first That he is in the right and I am in the wrong The other great End of Religion which is our happiness here Has been generally agreed on by all Mankind as appears in the Records of all their Laws as well as all their Religions which come to be establisht by the concurrence of men's Customs and and Opinions though in the latter that concurrence may have been produced by Divine Impressions or Inspirations For all agree in teaching and commanding in planting and improving not only those Moral Virtues which conduce to the felicity and tranquillity of every private man's life But
OBSERVATIONS UPON THE United Provinces OF THE NETHERLANDS By Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE of Shene in the County of Surrey Baronet Ambassador at the Hague and at Aix la Chappellè in the year 1668. LONDON Printed by A. Maxwell for Sa. Gellibrand at the Golden Ball in St. Paul's Church-yard 1673. THE PREFACE HAving lately seen the State of the United Provinces after a prodigious growth in Riches Beauty extent of Commerce and number of Inhabitants arrived at length to such a heighth by the strength of their Navies their fortified Towns and standing-Forces with a constant Revenue proportion'd to the support of all this Greatness As made them the Envy of some the Fear of others and the Wonder of all their Neighbours We have this Summer past beheld the same State in the midst of great appearing Safety Order Strength and Vigor Almost ruin'd and broken to pieces in some few days and by very few blows And reduced in a manner to its first Principles of Weakness and Distress Exposed opprest and very near at Mercy Their Inland-Provinces swallowed up by an Invasion almost as sudden and unresisted as the Inundations to which the others are subject And the remainders of their State rather kept alive by neglect or disconcert of its Enemies than by any strength of Nature or endeavours at its own recovery Now because such a Greatness and such a Fall of this State seem Revolutions unparallel'd in any Story and hardly conceived even by those who have lately seen them I thought it might be worth an idle man's time to give some account of the Rise and Progress of this Commonwealth The Causes of their Greatness And the steps towards their fall Which were all made by motions perhaps little taken notice of by common eyes and almost undiscernable to any man that was not placed to the best advantage and something concerned as well as much enclin'd to observe them The usual Duty of Employments abroad imposed not only by Custom but by Orders of State made it fit for me to prepare some formal Account of this Countrey and Government after Two years Ambassy in the midst of so great Conjunctures and Negotiations among them And such a Revolution as has since happen'd there though it may have made these Discourses little important to His Majesty or His Council Yet it will not have render'd them less agreeable to common eyes who like men that live near the Sea will run out upon the Cliffs to gaze at it in a Storm though they would not look out of their Windows to see it in a Calm Besides at a time when the Actions of this Scene take up so generally the eyes and discourses of their Neighbours And the Maps of their Countrey grow so much in request I thought a Map of their State and Government would not be unwelcome to the World since it is full as necessary as the others To understand the late Revolutions and Changes among them And as no man's Story can be well written till he is dead so the account of this State could not be well given till its fall which may justly be dated from the Events of last Summer whatever fortunes may further attend them since therein we have seen the sudden and violent dissolution of that more Popular Government which had continued and made so much noise for above Twenty years in the World without the exercise or influence of the Authority of the Princes of Orange A part so essential in the first Constitutions of their State Nor can I wholly lose my pains in this Adventure when I shall gain the ease of answering this way at once those many Questions I have lately been used to upon this occasion Which made me first observe and wonder how ignorant we were generally in the Affairs and Constitutions of a Countrey so much in our eye the common road of our travels as well as subject of our talk and which we have been of late not only curious but concerned to know I am very sensible how ill a Trade it is to write where much is ventur'd and little can be gain'd since whoever does it ill is sure of contempt and the justliest that can be when no man provokes him to discover his own follies or to trouble the world If he writes well he raises the envy of those Wits that are possest of the Vogue and are jealous of their Preferment there as if it were in Love or in State And have found that the nearest way to their own Reputation lyes right or wrong by the derision of other men But however I am not in pain for 't is the affectation of Praise that makes the fear of Reproach And I write without other design than of entertaining very idle men and among them my self For I must confess that being wholly useless to the Publique And unacquainted with the cares of encreasing Riches which busie the World Being grown cold to the pleasures of younger or livelier men And having ended the Entertainments of Building and Planting which use to succeed them Finding little taste in common Conversation And trouble in much Reading from the care of my eyes since an illness contracted by many unnecessary diligences in my Employments abroad There can hardly be found an idler man than I Nor consequently one more excusable for giving way to such amusements as this Having nothing to do but to enjoy the ease of a private Life and Fortune which as I know no man envies so I thank God no man can reproach I am not ignorant that the vein of Reading never run lower than in this Age and seldom goes further than the design of raising a Stock to furnish some Calling or Conversation The desire of Knowledg being either laught out of doors by the Wit that pleases the Age or beaten out by Interest that so much possesses it And the amusement of Books giving way to the liberties or refinements of Pleasure that were formerly less known or less avowed than now Yet some there will always be found in the world who ask no more at their idle hours than to forget themselves And whether that be brought about by Drink or Play by Love or Business or by some diversions as idle as this 'T is all a case Besides it may possibly fall out at one time or other that some Prince or great Minister may not be ill pleased in these kind of Memorials upon such a Subject to trace the steps of Trade and Riches of Order and Power in a State and those likewise of weak or violent Counsels of corrupt or ill Conduct of Faction or Obstinacy which decay and dissolve the firmest Governments That so by reflections upon Forreign Events they may provide the better and the earlier against those at home and raise their own Honour and Happiness by equal degrees with the Prosperity and Safety of the Nations they govern For under favour of those who would pass for Wits in our Age by saying things which David
tells us the fool said in His And set up with bringing those Wares to Market which God knows have been always in the World though kept up in corners because they used to mark their Owners in former Ages with the Names of Buffoons Prophane or Impudent men Who deride all Form and Order as well as Piety and Truth And under the notion of Fopperies endeavour to dissolve the very Bonds of all Civil Society Though by the favour and protection thereof They themselves enjoy so much greater proportions of Wealth and of Pleasures than would fall to their share if all lay in common as they seem to design for then such Possessions would belong of right to the strongest and bravest among us Vnder favour of such men I believe it will be found at one time or other by all who shall try That whilst Human Nature continues what it is The same Orders in State The same Discipline in Armies The same Reverence for things Sacred And Respect of Civil Institutions The same Virtues and Dispositions of Princes and Magistrates derived by interest or imitation into the Customs and Humours of the people Will ever have the same effects upon the Strength and Greatness of all Governments and upon the Honour and Authority of those that Rule as well as the Happiness and Safety of those that Obey Nor are we to think Princes themselves losers or less entertain'd when we see them employ their time and their thoughts in so useful Speculations and to so glorious Ends But that rather thereby they attain their true Prerogative of being Happier as well as Greater than Subjects can be For all the Pleasures of Sense that any man can enjoy are within the reach of a private Fortune and ordinary Contrivance Grow fainter with age and duller with use Must be revived with intermissions and wait upon the returns of Appetite which are no more at call of the Rich than the Poor The slashes of Wit and good Humour that rise from the Vapours of Wine are little different from those that proceed from the heats of blood in the first approaches of Fevers or Frenzies And are to be valued but as indeed they are the effects of Distemper But the pleasures of Imagination as they heighten and refine the very pleasures of Sense so they are of larger extent and longer duration And if the most sensual man will confess there is a Pleasure in Pleasing He must likewise allow there is good to a man's self in doing good to others And the further this extends the higher it rises and the longer it lasts Besides there is Beauty in Order and there are Charms in well-deserved Praise And both are the greater by how much greater the Subject As the first appearing in a well-framed and well-governed State And the other arising from Noble and Generous Actions Nor can any veins of good Humour be greater than those that swell by the success of wise Counsels and by the fortunate Events of publique Affairs since a man that takes pleasure in doing good to Ten thousand must needs have more than he that takes none but in doing good to himself But these thoughts lead me too far and to little purpose Therefore I shall leave them for those I had first in my head concerning the State of the United Provinces And whereas the greatness of their Strength and Revenues grew out of the vastness of their Trade into which Their Religion their Manners and Dispositions their Scituation and the form of their Government were the chief Ingredients And this last had been raised partly upon an old foundation And partly with Materials brought together by many and various Accidents It will be necessary for the survey of this great Frame to give some account of the Rise and Progress of their State by pointing out the most remarkable occasions of the first and periods of the other To discover the Nature and Constitutions of their Government in its several parts and the motions of it from the first and smallest wheels To observe what is peculiar to them in their Scituation or Dispositions And what in their Religion To take a survey of their Trade and the Causes of it Of the Forces and Revenues which composed their Greatness And the Circumstances and Conjunctures which conspired to their Fall And these are the Heads that shall make the Order and Arguments in the several parts of these Observations The Contents CHap. I. Of the Rise and Progress of their State Chap. II. Of their Government Chap. III. Of their Scituation Chap. IV. Of their People and Dispositions Chap. V. Of their Religion Chap. VI. Of their Trade Chap. VII Of their Forces and Revenues Chap. VIII Of the Causes of their fall in 1672. The Printer to the Reader THE Author having not concerned himself in the publication of these Papers It has happen'd that for want of his Care in revising the Impression several faults are slipt in and some such as alter the sense For which I am to ask the Reader 's pardon and desire his trouble in correcting such as occur to me according to the following ERRATA Page 20. l 20. r. retaining p. 25. l. 26. r executions p. 46. l. 6. r. goes on p. 61. l. 2. r. forming p. 66. l. 9. r. eluded p. 90. l. 23. r. Gecommitteerde p. 91. l. 20. dele either p. 124. l. 28. r. being so much p. 173. l. 17. r. seemed CHAP. I. Of the Rise and Progress of the United Provinces WHoever will take a view of the Rise of this Commonwealth must trace it up as high as the first Commotions in the Seventeen Provinces under the Dutchess of Parma's Government and the true Causes of that more avowed and general Revolt in the Duke of Alva's time And to find out the natural Springs of those Revolutions must reflect upon that sort of Government under which the Inhabitants of those Provinces lived for so many Ages past in the subjection of their several Dukes or Counts till by Marriages Successions or Conquest they came to be united in the House of Burgundy under Philip surnamed The Good And afterwards in that of Austria under Philip Father of Charles the Fifth And lastly in the Person of that great Emperor incorporated with those vast Dominions of Germany and Spain Italy and the Indies Nor will it be from the purpose upon this search to run a little higher into the Antiquities of these Countries For though most men are contented only to see a River as it runs by them and talk of the changes in it as they happen when 't is troubled or when clear when it drowns the Countrey in a Flood or forsakes it in a Drowth Yet he that would know the nature of the water and the Causes of those Accidents so as to guess at their continuance or return must find out its source and observe with what strength it rises what length it runs and how many small streams fall in and feed it to such
Italy and Greece were stiled so by the Romans but whose Victories in obtaining new Seats and Orders in possessing them might make us allow them for a better polici'd people than they appeared by the vastness of their Multitude or the rage of their Battels VVherever they past and seated their Colonies and Dominions they left a Constitution which has since been called in most European Languages The States consisting of Three Orders Noble Ecclesiastical and Popular under the limited Principality of one Person with the stile of King Prince Duke or Count. The remainders at least or traces hereof appear still in all the Principalities founded by those people in Italy France and Spain and were of a piece with the present Constitutions in most of the great Dominions on t'other side the Rhyne And it seems to have been a temper first introduced by them between the Tyranny of the Eastern Kingdoms and the Liberty of the Grecian or Roman Commonwealths 'T is true the Goths were Gentiles when they first broke into the Roman Empire till one great swarm of this people upon treaty with one of the Roman Emperors and upon Concessions of a great Tract of Land to be a Seat for their Nation embraced at once the Christian Faith After which the same people breaking out of the limits had been allowed them and by fresh numbers bearing all down where they bent their march as they were a great means of propagating Religion in many parts of Europe where they extended their Conquests so the zeal of these new Proselytes warmed by the veneration they had for their Bishops and Pastors and enriched by the spoyls and possessions of so vast Countreys seem to have been the First that introduced the maintenance of the Churches and Clergy by endowments of Lands Lordships and Vassals appropriated to them For before this time the Authority of the Priesthood in all Religions seemed wholly to consist in the peoples opinion of their Piety Learning and Virtues or a reverence for their Character and Mystical Ceremonies and Institutions their Support or their Revenues in the voluntary Oblations of pious men the Bounty of Princes or in a certain share out of the Labours and Gains of those who lived under their Cure and not in any subjection of mens Lives or Fortunes which belonged wholly to the Civil Power And Ammianus though he taxes the Luxury of the Bishops in Valentinian's time yet he speaks of their Riches which occasioned or fomented it as arising wholly from the Oblations of the people But the Devotion of these new Christians introducing this new form of endowing their Churches and afterwards Pepin and Charlemaign King of the Franks upon their Victories in Italy and the favour of the Roman Bishop to their Title and Arms having annexed great Territories and Jurisdictions to that See This Example or Custom was followed by most Princes of the Northern Races through the rest of Europe and brought into the Clergy great possessions of Lands and by a necessary consequence a great share of Temporal Power from the dependances of their Subjects or Tenants by which means they came to be generally one of the Three Orders that composed the Assembly of the States in every Countrey This Constitution of the States had been establisht from time immemorial in the several Provinces of the Low-Countreys and was often assembled for determining Disputes about succession of their Princes where doubtful or contested For deciding those between the great Towns For raising a Milice for the defence of their Countreys in the wars of their Neighbours For Advice in time of Dangers abroad or Discontents at home But always upon the new Succession of a Prince and upon any new Impositions that were necessary on the people The use of this Assembly was another of those Liberties whereof the Inhabitants of these Provinces were so fond and so tenacious The rest besides those ancient Priviledges already mentioned of their Towns were Concessions and Graces of several Princes in particular Exemptions or Immunities Jurisdiction both in choice and exercise of Magigistracy and Civil Judicature within themselves or else in the customs of using none but Natives in Charges and Offices and passing all weighty Affairs by the great Council composed of the great Lords of the Countrey who were in a manner all Temporal there being but three Bishops in all the Seventeen Provinces till the time of Philip the second of Spain The Revenues of these Princes consisted in their ancient Demesnes in small Customs which yet grew considerable by the greatness of Trade in the Maritime Towns and in the voluntary Contributions of their Subjects either in the States or in particular Cities according to the necessities of their Prince or the affections of the people Nor were these frequent for the Forces of these Counts were composed of such Lords who either by their Governments or other Offices or by the tenure of their Lands were obliged to attend their Prince on Horse-back with certain numbers of men upon all his wars or else of a Milice which was call'd Les gens d' ordonnance who served on foot and were not unlike our Train-bands the use or at least stile whereof was renewed in Flanders upon the last VVar with France in 1667 when the Count Egmont was made by the Governour General de gens d' ordonnance These Forces were defrayed by the Cities or Countreys as the others were raised by the Lords when occasion required and all were licensed immediately when it was past so that they were of little charge to the Prince His wars were but with other Princes of his own size or Competitors to his Principality or sometimes with the Mutineys of his great Towns Short though violent and decided by one Battel or Siege unless they fell into the quarrels between England and France and then they were engaged but in the skirts of the VVar the gross of it being waged between the two Kings and these smaller Princes made use of for the credit of Alliance or sometimes the commodiousness of a Diversion rather than for any great weight they made in the main of the Affair The most frequent VVars of the Counts of Holland were with the Frisons a part of the old Saxons and the fiercest battels of some of the Counts of Flanders were with the Normans who past that way into France and were the last of those Nations that have infested the more Southern parts of Europe I have sometimes thought how it should have come to pass that the infinite swarm of that vast Northern-Hive which so often shook the world like a great Tempest and overflowed it like a great Torrent changing Names and Customs and Government and Language and the very face of Nature wherever they seated themselves which upon record of story under the name of Gauls pierced into Greece and Italy sacking Rome and besieging the Capitol in Camillus his time under that of the Cimbers marcht through France to the very confines of
Effects that are in it but in the Credit of the whole Town or State of Amsterdam whose Stock and Revenue is equal to that of some Kingdoms and who are bound to make good all Moneys that are brought into their Bank The Tickets or Bills hereof make all the usual great Payments that are made between man and man in the Town and not only in most other places of the United Provinces but in many other Trading-parts of the World So as this Bank is properly a general Cash where every man lodges his money because he esteems it safer and easier paid in and out than if it were in his Coffers at home And the Bank is so far from paying any Interest for what is there brought in that Money in the Bank is worth something more in common Payments than what runs current in Coyn from hand to hand No other money passing in the Bank but in the species of Coyn the best known the most ascertain'd and the most generally current in all parts of the Higher as well as the Lower Germany The Revenues of Amsterdam arise out of the constant Excise upon all sorts of Commodities bought and sold within the Precinct Or out of the Rents of those Houses or Lands that belong in common to the City Or out of certain Duties and Impositions upon every House towards the uses of Charity and the Repairs or Adornments or Fortifications of the place Or else out of extraordinary Levies consented to by the Senate for furnishing their part of the Publique Charge that is agreed to by their Deputies in the Provincial-States for the use of the Province Or by the Deputies of the States of Holland in the States-General for support of the Union And all these Payments are made into one Common Stock of the Town not as many of ours are into that of the Parish So as attempts may be easier made at the calculations of their whole Revenue And I have heard it affirmed That what is paid of all kinds to Publique Uses of the States-General the Province and the City in Amsterdam amounts to above Sixteen hundred thousand pounds Sterling a year But I enter into no Computations nor give these for any thing more than what I have heard from men who pretended to make such Enquiries which I confess I did not 'T is certain that in no Town Strength Beauty and Convenience are better provided for nor with more unlimited Expence than in this by the Magnificence of their Publique Buildings as Stadthouse and Arsenals The Number and Spaciousness as well as Order and Revenues of their many Hospitals The commodiousness of their Canals running through the chief Streets of passage The mighty strength of their Bastions and Ramparts And the neatness as well as convenience of their Streets so far as can be compassed in so great a confluence of industrious people All which could never be atchieved without a Charge much exceeding what seems proportioned to the Revenue of one single Town The Senate chuses the Deputies which are sent from this City to the States of Holland The Soveraignty whereof is represented by Deputies of the Nobles and Towns composing Nineteen Voices Of which the Nobles have only the first and the Cities eighteen according to the number of those which are called Stemms The other Cities and Towns of the Province having no voice in the States These Cities were originally but Six Dort Haerlem Delf Leyden Amsterdam and Tergoâ— But were encreased by Prince William of Nassaw to the number of Eighteen by the addition of Rotterdam Gorcum Schedam Schonoven Briel Alcmaer Horne Enchusen Edam Moninckdam Medenblick and Permeren This makes as great an inequality in the Government of the Province by such a small City as Permeren having an equal voice in the the Provincial-States with Amsterdam which pays perhaps half of all charge of the Province as seems to be in the States-General by so small a Province as Overyssel having an equal voice in the States-General with that of Holland which contributes more than half to the general charge of the Union But this was by some Writers of that Age interpreted to be done by the Prince's Authority to lessen that of the Nobles and balance that of the greater Cities by the voices of the smaller whose dependances were easier to be gained and secured The Nobles though they are few in this Province yet are not represented by all their number but by Eight or Nine who as Deputies from their Body have session in the States-Provincial And who when one among them dyes chuse another to succeed him Though they have all together but one voice equal to the smallest Town yet are they very considerable in the Government by possessing many of the best Charges both Civil and Military by having the direction of all the Ecclesiastical Revenue that was seized by the State upon the change of Religion and by sending their Deputies to all the Councils both of the Generalty and the Province and by the nomination of one Councellor in the two great Courts of Justice They give their Voice first in the Assembly of the States and thereby a great weight to the business in consultation The Pensioner of Holland is seated with them delivers their Voice for them and assists at all their Deliberations before they come to the Assembly He is properly but Minister or Servant of the Province and so his Place or Rank is behind all their Deputies but has always great Credit because he is perpetual or seldom discharged though of right he ought to be chosen or renewed every third year He has place in all the several Assemblies of the Province and in the States proposes all Affairs gathers the Opinions and forms or digests the Resolutions Pretending likewise a power not to conclude any very important Affair by plurality of Voices when he judges in his Conscience he ought not to do it and that it will be of ill consequence or prejudice to the Province The Deputies of the Cities are drawn out of the Magistrates and Senate of each Town Their Number is uncertain and arbitrary according to the Customs or Pleasure of the Cities that send them because they have all together but one Voice and are all maintained at their Cities charge But commonly one of the Burgomasters and the Pensioner are of the number The States of Holland have their Session in the Court at the Hague and assemble ordinarily four times a year in February June September and November In the former Sessions they provide for the filling up of all vacant Charges and for renewing the Farms of all the several Taxes and for consulting about any matters that concern either the general good of the Province or any particular differences arising between the Towns But in November they meet purposely to resolve upon the continuance of the Charge which falls to the share of their Province the following year according to what may have been agreed upon by the
according to their different or agreeing Customs To the States-General every one sends their Deputies in what number they please some Two some Ten or Twelve Which makes no difference because all matters are carried not by the Votes of Persons but of Provinces and all the Deputies from one Province how few or many soever have one single Vote The Provinces differ likewise in the time fixed for their Deputation some sending for a year some for more and others for life The Province of Holland send to the States-General one of their Nobles who is perpetual Two Deputies chosen out of their Eight chief Towns and One out of North-Holland and with these Two of their Provincial Council of State and their Pensioner Neither Stadtholder or Governour or any person in Military-charge has Session in the States-General Every Province presides their week in turns and by the most qualified person of the Deputies of that Province He sits in a Chair with arms at the middle of a long Table capable of holding about thirty persons For about that number this Council is usually composed of The Greffier who is in nature of a Secretary sits at the lower end of the Table When a Forreign Minister has audience he is seated at the middle of this Table over-against the President Who proposes all matters in this Assembly Makes the Greffier read all Papers Puts the Question Calls the Voices of the Provinces And forms the Conclusion Or if he refuses to conclude according to the plurality he is obliged to resign his Place to the President of the ensuing Week who concludes for him This is the course in all Affairs before them except in cases of Peace and War of Forreign Alliances of Raising or Coining of Moneys or the Priviledges of each Province or Member of the Union In all which All the Provinces must concur Plurality being not at all weighed or observed This Counsel is not Soveraign but only represents the Soveraignty and therefore though Ambassadors are both received and sent in their Name yet neither are their own chosen nor Forreign Ministers answered nor any of those mentioned Affairs resolved without consulting first the States of each Province by their respective Deputies and receiving Orders from them And in other important matters though decided by Plurality They frequently consult with the Council of State Nor has this Method or Constitution ever been broken since their State began excepting only in one Affair which was in January 1668 when His Majesty sent me over to propose a League of Mutual Defence with this State and another for the preservation of Flanders from the invasion of France which had already conquered a great part of the Spanish Provinces and left the rest at the mercy of the next Campania Upon this occasion I had the fortune to prevail with the States-General to conclude three Treaties and upon them draw up and sign the several Instruments in the space of Five days Without passing the essential forms of their Government by any recourse to the Provinces which must likewise have had it to the several Cities There I knew those Forreign Ministers whose Duty and Interest it was to oppose this Affair expected to meet and to elude it which could not have failed in case it had run that circle since engaging the Voice of one City must have broken it 'T is true that in concluding these Alliances without Commission from their Principals The Deputies of the States-General ventur'd their Heads if they had been disowned by their Provinces but being all unanimous and led by the clear evidence of so direct and so important an Interest which must have been lost by the usual delays They all agreed to run the hazzard and were so far from being disowned that they were applauded by all the Members of every Province Having thereby changed the whole face of Affairs in Christendom and laid the Foundation of the Triple-Alliance and the Peace of Aix which were concluded about Four Months after So great has the force of Reason and Interest ever proved in this State not only to the uniting of all Voices in their Assemblies but to the absolving of the greatest breach of their Original Constitutions Even in a State whose Safety and Greatness has been chiefly founded upon the severe and exact observance of Order and Method in all their Counsels and Executions Nor have they ever used at any other time any greater means to agree and unite the several Members of their Union in the Resolutions necessary upon the most pressing occasions Than for the agreeing-Provinces to name some of their ablest persons to go and confer with the dissenting and represent those Reasons and Interests by which they have been induced to their opinions The Council of State is composed of Deputies from the several Provinces but after another manner than the States-General the number being fixed Gelderland sends Two Holland Three Zealand and Utrecht Two a piece Friezland Overyssel and Groninghen each of them One making in all Twelve They vote not by Provinces but by Personal Voices and every Deputy presides by turns In this Council the Governour of the Provinces has Session and a decisive voice And the Treasurer-General Session but a voice only deliberative yet he has much credit here being for life and so is the person deputed to this Council from the Nobles of Holland and the Deputies of the Province of Zealand The rest are but for two three or four years The Council of State executes the Resolutions of the States-General consults and proposes to them the most expedient ways of raising Troops and levying Moneys as well as the proportions of both which they conceive necessary in all Conjunctures and Revolutions of the State Superintends the Milice the Fortifications the Contributions out of Enemies Countrey the forms and disposal of all Passports and the Affairs Revenues and Government of all places conquered since the Union which being gain'd by the common Arms of the State depend upon the States-General and not upon any particular Province Towards the end of every year this Council forms a state of the Expence they conceive will be necessary for the year ensuing Presents it to the States-General desiring them to demand so much of the States-Provincial to be raised according to the usual Proportions which are of 100000 G rs Gelderland 3612 g rs 05 st 00 d Holland 58309 g rs 01 st 10 d Zealand 9183 g rs 14 st 02 d Utrecht 5830 g rs 17 st 11 d Friezland 11661 g rs 15 st 10 d Overyssel 3571 g rs 08 st 04 d Groningue 5830 g rs 17 st 11 d This Petition as 't is called is made to the States-General in the Name of the Governour and Council of State which is but a continuance of the forms used in the time of their Soveraigns and still by the Governours and Council of State in the Spanish Netherlands Petition signifying barely asking or demanding though implying the thing
demanded to be wholly in the right and power of them that give It was used by the first Counts only upon extraordinary occasions and necessities but in the time of the Houses of Burgundy and Austria grew to be a thing of course and Annual as it is still in the Spanish Provinces The Council of State disposes of all sums of Money destin'd for all extraordinary Affairs and expedites the Orders for the whole expence of the State upon the Resolutions first taken in the main by the States-General The Orders must be signed by three Deputies of several Provinces as well as by the Treasurer-General and then registred in the Chamber of Accounts before the Receiver-General pays them which is then done without any difficulty charge or delay Every Province raises what Moneys it pleases and by what ways or means sends its Quota or share of the general charge to the Receiver-General and converts the rest to the present use or reserves it for the future occasions of the Province The Chamber of Accounts was erected about sixty years ago for the ease of the Council of State to examine and state all Accounts of all the several Receivers to controul and register the Orders of the Council of State which disposes of the Finances and this Chamber is composed of two Deputies from each Province who are changed every Three years Besides these Colledges is the Council of the Admiralty who when the States-General by advice of the Council of State have destin'd a Fleet of such a number and force to be set out Have the absolute disposition of the Marine Affairs as well in the choice and equipage of all the several Ships as in issuing the Moneys allotted for that service This Colledg is subdivided into Five of which three are in Holland viz. one in Amsterdam another at Rotterdam and the third at Horn The fourth is at Middlebourgh in Zealand and the fifth at Harlinguen in Friezland Each of these is composed of Seven Deputies Four of that Province where the Colledg resides and Three named by the other Provinces The Admiral or in his absence the Vice-Admiral has Session in all these Colledges and presides when he is present They take cognizance of all Crimes committed at Sea judg all Pirates that are taken and all Frauds or Negligences in the payment or collections of the Customs which are particularly affected to the Admiralty and appliable to no other use This Fond being not sufficient in times of Wars is supplied by the States with whatever more is necessary from other Fonds but in time of Peace being little exhausted by other constant charge besides that of Convoys to their several Fleets of Merchants in all parts The remainder of this Revenue is applied to the building of great Ships of War and furnishing the several Arsenals and Stores with all sorts of Provision necessary for the building and rigging of more Ships than can be needed by the course of a long War So soon as the number and force of the Fleets designed for any Expedition is agreed by the States-General and given out by the Council of State to the Admiralty Each particular Colledg furnishes their own proportion which is known as well as that of the several Provinces in all Moneys that are to be raised In all which the Admiral has no other share or advantages besides his bare Salary and his proportion in Prizes that are taken The Captains and Superior Officers of each Squadron are chosen by the several Colledges the number of men appointed for every ship After which each Captain uses his best diligence and credit to fill his number with the best men he can get and takes the whole care and charge of Victualling his own Ship for the time intended for that Expedition and signifi'd to him by the Admiralty and this at a certain rate of so much a man And by the good or ill discharge of his Trust as well as that of providing Chirurgeons Medicines and all things necessary for the health of the men each Captain grows into good or ill credit with the Sea-men and by their report with the Admiralties Upon whose opinion and esteem the fortune of all Sea-Officers depends So as in all their Expeditions there appears rather an emulation among the particular Captains who shall treat his Sea-men best in these points and employ the Moneys allotted for their Victualling to the best advantage Than any little Knavish Practises of filling their own Purses by keeping their men's Bellys empty or forcing them to corrupted unwholsome Diet Upon which and upon cleanliness in their Ships the health of many people crowded up into so little Rooms seems chiefly to depend The Salaries of all the great Officers of this State are very small I have already mentioned that of a Burgo-master's of Amsterdam to be about fifty pounds sterling a year That of their Vice-Admiral for since the last Prince of Orange's death to the year 1670 there had been no Admiral is Five hundred and that of the Pensioner of Holland Two hundred The Greatness of this State seems much to consist in these Orders how confused soever and of different pieces they may seem But more in two main effects of them which are the good choice of the Officers of chief Trust in the Cities Provinces and State And the great simplicity and modesty in the common port or living of their chiefest Ministers without which the Absoluteness of the Senates in each Town and the Immensity of Taxes throughout the whole State would never be endured by the people with any patience being both of them greater than in many of those Governments which are esteemed most Arbitrary among their Neighbours But in the Assemblies and Debates of their Senates every man's Abilities are discovered as their Dispositions are in the conduct of their Lives and Domestick among their fellow-Citizens The observation of these either raises or suppresses the credit of particular men both among the people and the Senates of their Towns who to maintain their Authority with less popular envy or discontent give much to the general opinion of the people in the choice of their Magistrates By this means it comes to pass that though perhaps the Nation generally be not wise yet the Government is Because it is composed of the wisest of the Nation which may give it an advantage over many others where Ability is of more common growth but of less use to the Publique If it happens that neither Wisdom nor Honesty are the Qualities which bring men to the management of State-Affairs as they usually do in this Commonwealth Besides though these people who are naturally Cold and Heavy may not be ingenious enough to furnish a pleasant or agreeable Conversation yet they want not plain down-right sence to understand and do their business both publique and private which is a Talent very different from the other and I know not whether they often meet For the first proceeds from heat of
of all Land and Sea-Forces as Captain-General and Admiral and thereby the disposition of all Military Commands The power of pardoning the Penalty of Crimes The chusing of Magistrates upon the nomination of the Towns For they presented three to the Prince who elected one out of that number Originally the States-General were convoked by the Council of State where the Prince had the greatest influence Nor since that change have the States used to resolve any important matter without his advice Besides all this As the States-General represented the Soveraignty so did the Prince of Orange the Dignity of this State by publique Guards and the attendance of all Military Officers By the application of all Forreign Ministers and all pretenders at home By the splendour of his Court and magnificence of his Expence supported not only by the Pensions and Rights of his several Charges and Commands but by a mighty Patrimonial Revenue in Lands and Soveraign Principalities and Lordships as well in France Germany and Burgundy as in the several parts of the Seventeen Provinces so as Prince Henry was used to answer some that would have flattered him into the designs of a more Arbitrary Power That he had as much as any wise Prince would desire in that State since he had all indeed besides that of Punishing men and raising Money whereas he had rather the envy of the first should lye upon the Forms of the Government and he knew the other could never be supported without the consent of the people to that degree which was necessary for the defence of so small a State against so mighty Princes as their Neighbours Upon these Foundations was this State first establisht and by these Orders maintained till the death of the last Prince of Orange When by the great influence of the Province of Holland amongst the rest the Authority of the Princes came to be shared among the several Magistracies of the State Those of the Cities assumed the last nomination of their several Magistrates The States-Provincial the disposal of all Military Commands in those Troops which their share was to pay And the States-General the Command of the Armies by Officers of their own appointment substituted and changed at their will No power remain'd to pardon what was once condemned by rigor of Law Nor any person to represent the Port and Dignity of a Soveraign State Both which could not fail of being sensibly missed by the people since no man in particular can be secure of offending or would therefore absolutely despair of impunity himself though he would have others do so And men are generally pleased with the Pomp and Splendor of a Government not only as it is an amusement for idle people but as it is a mark of the Greatness Honour and Riches of their Countrey However these Defects were for near Twenty years supplied in some measure and this Frame supported by the great Authority and Riches of the Province of Holland which drew a sort of dependance from the other Six and by the great Sufficiency Integrity and Constancy of their chief Minister and by the effect of both in the prosperous Successes of their Affairs Yet having a Constitution strained against the current vein and humour of the people It was always evident that upon the growth of this young Prince The great Virtues and Qualities he derived from the mixture of such Royal and such Princely Blood could not fail in time of raising His Authority to equal at least if not to surpass that of his glorious Ancestors CHAP. III. Of their Scituation HOLLAND Zealand Friezland and Groninguen are seated upon the Sea and make the Strength and Greatness of this State The other three with the Conquered Towns in Brabant Flanders and Cleve make only the Out-works or Frontiers serving chiefly for safety and defence of these No man can tell the strange and mighty Changes that may have been made in the face and bounds of Maritime Countreys at one time or other by furious Inundations upon the unusual concurrence of Land-Floods Winds and Tides And therefore no man knows whether the Province of Holland may not have been in some past Ages all Wood and rough unequal ground as some old Traditions go And level'd to what we see by the Sea 's breaking in and continuing long upon the Land since recovered by its recess and with the help of Industry For it is evident that the Sea for some space of years advances continually upon one Coast retiring from the opposite and in another Age quite changes this course yeilding up what it had seized and seizing what it had yeilded up without any reason to be given of such contrary motions But I suppose this great change was made in Holland when the Sea first parted England from the Continent breaking through a neck of Land between Dover and Calais Which may be a Tale but I am sure is no Record It is certain on the contrary that Sixteen hundred years ago there was no usual mention or memory of any such Changes and that the face of all these Coasts and nature of the Soil especially that of Holland was much as it is now allowing only the Improvements of Riches Time and Industry Which appears by the description made in Tacitus both of the limits of the Isle of Batavia and the nature of the Soil as well as the Climate and the very names of Rivers still remaining 'T is likely the Changes arrived since that Age in these Countreys may have been made by stoppages grown in time with the rolling of Sands upon the mouths of three great Rivers which disimbogued into the Sea through the Coasts of these Provinces That is the Rhine the Mose and the Scheld The ancient Rhyne divided where Skencksconce now stands into two Rivers of which one kept the name till running near Leyden it fell into the Sea at Catwick Where are still seen at low Tides the foundations of an ancient Roman Castle that commanded the mouth of this River But this is wholly stopt up though a great Canal still preserves the Name of the old Rhine The Mose running by Dort and Rotterdam fell as it now does into the Sea at the Briel with mighty issues of water But the Sands gather'd for three or four Leagues upon this Coast makes the Haven extream dangerous without great skill of Pilots and use of Pilot-boats that come out with every Tide to welcome and secure the Ships bound for that River And it is probable that these Sands having obstructed the free course of the River has at times caused or encreased those Inundations out of which so many Islands have been recovered and of which that part of the Countrey is much composed The Scheld seems to have had its issue by Walcheren in Zealand which was an Island in the mouth of that River till the Inundations of that and the Mose seem to have been joyned together by some great Helps or Irruptions of the Sea by
much into Italy seldomer into Spain nor often into the more Northern Countreys unless in company or train of their Publique Ministers The chief End of their Breeding is to make them fit for the service of their Countrey in the Magistracy of their Towns their Provinces and their State And of these kind of men are the Civil Officers of this Government generally composed being descended of Families who have many times been constantly in the Magistracy of their Native Towns for many Years and some for several Ages Such were most or all of the chief Ministers and the persons that composed their chief Councils in the time of my residence among them and not men of mean or Mechanick Trades as it is commonly received among Forreigners and makes the subject of Comical Jests upon their Government This does not exclude many Merchants or Traders in gross from being often seen in the Offices of their Cities and sometimes deputed to their States Nor several of their States from turning their Stocks in the management of some very beneficial Trade by Servants and Houses maintained to that purpose But the generality of the States and Magistrates are of the other sort Their Estates consisting in the Pensions of their Publique Charges in the Rents of Lands or Interest of Money upon the Cantores or in Actions of the East-Indy Company or in Shares upon the Adventures of great Trading-Merchants Nor do these Families habituated as it were to the Magistracy of their Towns and Provinces usually arrive at great or excessive Riches The Salaries of Publique Employments and Interest being low but the Revenue of Lands being yet very much lower and seldom exceeding the profit of Two in the Hundred They content themselves with the hohour of being useful to the Publique with the esteem of their Cities or their Countrey and with the ease of their Fortunes which seldom fails by the frugality of their living grown universal by being I suppose at first necessary but since honourable among them The mighty growth and excess of Riches is seen among the Merchants and Traders whose application lyes wholly that way and who are the better content to have so little share in the Government desiring only security in what they possess Troubled with no cares but those of their Fortunes and the management of their Trades and turning the rest of their time and thought to the divertisement of their lives Yet these when they attain great wealth chuse to breed up their Sons in the way and marry their Daughters into the Families of those others most generally credited in their Towns and versed in their Magistracies And thereby introduce their Families into the way of Government and Honour which consists not here in Titles but in Publique Employments The next Rank among them is that of their Gentlemen or Nobles who in the Province of Holland to which I chiefly confine these Observations are very few most of the Families having been extinguished in the long Wars with Spain But those that remain are in a manner all employ'd in the Military or Civil Charges of the Province or State These are in their Customs and Manners and way of living a good deal different from the rest of the people and having been bred much abroad rather affect the Garb of their Neighbour-Courts than the Popular Air of their own Countrey They value themselves more upon their Nobility than men do in other Countreys where 't is more common and would think themselves utterly dishonoured by the marriage of one that were not of their Rank though it were to make up the broken Fortune of a Noble Family by the Wealth of a Plebean They strive to imitate the French in their Meen their Clothes their way of Talk of Eating of Gallantry or Debauchery And are in my mind something worse than they would be by affecting to be better than they need making sometimes but ill Copies whereas they might be good Originals by refining or improving the Customs and Virtues proper to their own Countrey and Climate They are otherwise an Honest Well-natur'd Friendly and Gentlemanly sort of men and acquit themselves generally with Honour and Merit where their Countrey employs them The Officers of their Armies live after the Customs and Fashions of the Gentlemen And so do many Sons of the rich Merchants who returning from travel abroad have more designs upon their own pleasure and the vanity of appearing than upon the Service of their Countrey Or if they pretend to enter into that it is rather by the Army than the State And all these are generally desirous to see a Court in their Countrey that they may value themselves at home by the Qualities they have learnt abroad and make a Figure which agrees better with their own Humour and the manner of Courts than with the Customs and Orders that prevail in more Popular Governments There are some Customs or Dispositions that seem to run generally through all these Degrees of men among them As great Frugality and order in their Expences Their common Riches lye in every man's having more than he spends or to say it more properly In every man's spending less than he has coming in be that what it will Nor does it enter into men's heads among them That the common port or course of Expence should equal the Revenue and when this happens they think at least they have liv'd that year to no purpose And the train of it discredits a man among them as much as any vicious or prodigal Extravagance does in other Countreys This enables every man to bear their extream Taxes and makes them less sensible than they would be in other places For he that lives upon Two parts in Five of what he has coming in if he pays Two more to the State he does but part with what he should have laid up and had no present use for Whereas he that spends yearly what he receives if he pays but the Fiftieth part to the Publique it goes from him like that which was necessary to buy Bread or Clothes for himself or his Family This makes the beauty and strength of their Towns the commodiousness of travelling in their Countrey by their Canals Bridges and Cawseys the pleasantness of their Walks and their Grafts in and near all their Cities And in short the Beauty Convenience and sometimes Magnificence of all Publique Works to which every man pays as willingly and takes as much pleasure and vanity in them as those of other Countreys do in the same circumstances among the Possessions of their Families or private Inheritance What they can spare besides the necessary expence of their Domestique the Publique Payments and the common course of still encreasing their Stock Is laid out in the Fabrick Adornment or Furniture of their Houses Things not so transitory or so prejudicial to Health and to Business as the constant Excesses and Luxury of Tables Nor perhaps altogether so vain as the extravagant Expences of Clothes and
Attendance At least these end wholly in a man's self and the satisfaction of his personal Humour whereas the other make not only the Riches of a Family but contribute much towards the publique Beauty and Honour of a Countrey The order in casting up their Expences is so great and general that no man offers at any Undertaking which he is not prepared for and Master of his Design before he begins so as I have neither observed nor heard of any Building publique or private that has not been finished in the time designed for it So are their Canals Cawseys and Bridges so was their Way from the Hague to Skeveling a Work that might have become the old Romans considering how soon it was dispatcht The House at the Hague built purposely for casting of Cannon was finisht in one Summer during the heat of the first English War and lookt rather like a design of Vanity in their Government than Necessity or Use. The Stadthouse of Amsterdam has been left purposely to time without any limitation in the first Design either of that or of Expence both that the Diligence and the Genius of so many succeeding Magistrates should be employ'd in the collection of all things that could be esteemed proper to encrease the Beauty or Magnificence of that Structure And perhaps a little to reprieve the experiment of a current Prediction That the Trade of that City should begin to fall the same year the Stadthouse should be finisht as it did at Antwerp Charity seems to be very National among them though it be regulated by Orders of the Countrey and not usually moved by the common Objects of Compassion But it is seen in the admirable Provisions that are made out of it for all sorts of persons that can want or ought to be kept in a Government Among the many and various Hospitals that are in every man's curiosity and talk that travels their Countrey I was affected with none more than that of the aged Sea-men at Enchusyen which is contrived finished and ordered as if it were done with a kind intention of some well-natur'd man That those who had past their whole lives in the Hardships and Incommodities of the Sea should find a Retreat stor'd with all the Eases and Conveniences that Old-age is capable of feeling and enjoying And here I met with the only rich man that I ever saw in my life For one of these old Sea-men entertaining me a good while with the plain Stories of his Fifty years Voyages and Adventures while I was viewing their Hospital and the Church adjoining I gave him at parting a piece of their Coin about the value of a Crown He took it smiling and offer'd it me again but when I refused it he askt me what he should do with Money for all that ever they wanted was provided for them at their House I left him to overcome his Modesty as he could but a Servant coming after me saw him give it to a little Girl that open'd the Church-door as she past by him Which made me reflect upon the fantastick calculation of Riches and Poverty that is current in the world by which a man that wants a Million is a Prince He that wants but a Groat is a Beggar and this was a poor man that wanted nothing at all In general All Appetites and Passions seem to run lower and cooler here than in other Countreys where I have converst Avarice may be excepted And yet that should not be so violent where it feeds only upon Industry and Parsimony as where it breaks out into Fraud Rapine and Oppression But Quarrels are seldom seen among them unless in their drink Revenge rarely heard of or Jealousie known Their Tempers are not aiery enough for Joy or any unusual strains of pleasant Humour nor warm enough for Love This is talkt of sometimes among the younger men but as a thing they have heard of rather than felt and as a discourse that becomes them rather than affects them I have known some among them that personated Lovers well enough but none that I ever thought were at heart in love Nor any of the Women that seem'd at all to care whether they were so or no. Whether it be that they are such lovers of their Liberty as not to bear the servitude of a Mistris any more than that of a Master Or that the dulness of their Air renders them less susceptible of more refined Passions Or that they are diverted from it by the general intention every man has upon his business whatever it is nothing being so mortal an Enemy of Love that suffers no Rival as any bent of thought another way The same Causes may have had the same Effects among their married Women who have the whole care and absolute management of all their Domestique And live with very general good Fame A certain sort of Chastity being hereditary and habitual among them as Probity among the Men. The same dulness of Air may dispose them to that strange assiduity and constant application of their minds with that perpetual Study and Labour upon any thing they design and take in hand This gives them patience to pursue the quest of Riches by so long Voyages and Adventures to the Indies and by so long Parsimony as that of their whole lives Nay I have for a more particular example of this Disposition among them known one man that employ'd Four and twenty years about the making and perfecting of a Globe and another above Thirty about the inlaying of a Table Nor does any man know how much may have been contributed towards the great things in all kinds both publique and private that have been atchieved among them by this one Humour of never giving over what they imagine may be brought to pass nor leaving one sent to follow another they meet with Which is the property of the lighter and more ingenious Nations And the Humour of a Government being usually the same with that of the persons that compose it Not only in this but in all other points so as where men that govern are Wise Good Steady and Just the Government will appear so too and the contrary where they are otherwise The same Qualities in their Air may encline them to the Entertainments and Customs of Drinking which are so much laid to their charge and for ought I know may not only be necessary to their Health as they generally believe it but to the vigour and improvement of their Understandings in the midst of a thick foggy Air and so much coldness of Temper and Complexion For though the use or excess of drinking may destroy men's Abilities who live in better Climates and are of warmer Constitutions Wine to hot Brains being like Oyl to Fire and making the Spirits by too much lightness evaporate into smoak and perfect aiery imaginations Or by too much heat rage into Frenzy or at least into Humours and Thoughts that have a great mixture of it Yet on
the other side it may improve men's Parts and Abilities of cold Complexions and in dull Air and may be necessary to thaw and move the frozen or unactive Spirits of the Brain To rowse sleepy Thought and refine grosser Imaginations and perhaps to animate the Spirits of the Heart as well as enliven those of the Brain Therefore the old Germans seem'd to have some reason in their Custom Not to execute any great Resolutions which had not been twice debated and agreed at two several Assemblies one in an Afternoon and t'other in a Morning Because they thought their Counsels might want Vigour when they were sober as well as Caution when they had drunk Yet in Holland I have observed very few of their chief Officers or Ministers of State vicious in this kind Or if they drunk much 't was only at set-Feasts and rather to acquit themselves than of choice or inclination And for the Merchants and Traders with whom it is customary They never do it in a morning nor till they come from the Exchange where the business of the day is commonly dispatcht Nay it hardly enters into their heads that 't is lawful to drink at all before that time but they will excuse it if you come to their House and tell you how sorry they are you come in a morning when they cannot offer you to drink as if at that time of day it were not only unlawful for them to drink themselves but so much as a stranger to do it within their Walls The Afternoon or at least the Evening is given to whatever they find will divert them And is no more than needs considering how they spend the rest of the day in Thought or in Cares in Toils or in Business For Nature cannot hold out with constant labour of Body and as little with constant bent or application of mind Much motion of the same parts of the Brain either weary and waste them too fast for repair or else as it were fire the wheels and so end either in geâ—eral decays of the Body or distractions of the Mind For these are usually occasion'd by perpetual motions of Thought about some one Object whether it be about ones self in excesses of Pride or about another in those of Love or of Grief Therefore none are so excusable as men of much care and thought or of great business for giving up their times of leisure to any pleasures or diversions that offend no Laws nor hurt others or themselves And this seems the reason that in all Civil Constitutions not only Honours but Riches are annexed to the Charges of those who govern and upon whom the Publique cares are meant to be devolved Not only that they may not be distracted from these by the cares of their own Domestique or private Interests but that by the help of Esteem and of Riches they may have those Pleasures and Diversions in their reach which idle men neither need nor deserve but which are necessary for the refreshment or repair of Spirits exhausted with Cares and with Toil and which serve to sweeten and preserve those Lives that would otherwise wear out too fast or grow too uneasie in the Service of the Publique The two Characters that are left by the old Roman Writers of the ancient Batavi or Hollanders are That they were both the bravest among the German Nations and the most obstinate lovers and defenders of their Liberty Which made them exempted from all Tribute by the Romans who desir'd only Soldiers of their Nation to make up some of their Auxiliary-Bands as they did in former Ages of those Nations in Italy that were their Friends and Allies The last Disposition seems to have continued constant and National among them ever since that time and never to have more appeared than in the Rise and Constitutions of their present State It does not seem to be so of the First or that the people in general can be said now to be Valiant a quality of old so National among them and which by the several Wars of the Counts of Holland especially with the Frizons and by the desperate Defences made against the Spaniards by this people in the beginnings of their State should seem to have lasted long and to have but lately decayed That is since the whole application of their Natives has been turn'd to Commerce and Trade and the vein of their Domestique lives so much to Parsimony by Circumstances which will be the Subject of another Chapter and since the main of all their Forces and body of their Army has been composed and continually supplied out of their Neighbour-Nations For Soldiers and Merchants are not found by experience to be more incompatible in their abode than the Dispositions and Customs seem to be different that render a people sit for Trade and for War The Soldier thinks of a short life and a merry The Trader reckons upon a long and a painful One intends to make his Fortunes suddenly by his Courage by Victory and Spoil The t'other slower but surer by Craft by Treaty and by Industry This makes the first franc and generous and throw away upon his Pleasures what has been gotten in one Danger and may either be lost or repaired in the next The other wary and frugal and loath to part with in a day what he has been labouring for a year and has no hopes to recover but by the same paces of Diligence and Time One aims only to preserve what he has as the fruit of his Father's pains or what he shall get as the fruit of his own T'other thinks the price of a little Blood is more than of a great deal of Sweat and means to live upon other men's Labours and possess in an hour what they have been years in acquiring This makes one love to live under stanch Orders and Laws While t'other would have all depend upon Arbitrary Power and Will The Trader reckons upon growing Richer and by his account Better the longer he lives which makes him careful of his Health and his Life and so apt to be orderly and temperate in his Diet While the Soldier is thoughtless or prodigal of both and having not his Meat ready at hours or when he has a mind to it Eats full and greedily whenever he gets to it And perhaps difference of Diet may make greater difference in men's natural Courage than is commonly thought of For Courage may proceed in some measure from the temper of Air may be form'd by Discipline and acquir'd by Use or infus'd by Opinion But that which is more natural and so more National in some Countreys than in others seems to arise from the heat or strength of Spirits about the Heart Which may a great deal depend upon the measure and the substance of the food men are used to This made a great Physician among us say He would make any man a Coward with six weeks dietting and Prince Maurice of Orange call for the English
also those Manners and Dispositions that tend to the Peace Order and Safety of all Civil Societies and Governments among men Nor could I ever understand how those who call themselves and the world usually calls Religious Men come to put so great weight upon those points of Belief which men never have agreed in and so little upon those of Virtue and Morality in which they have hardly ever disagreed Nor why a State should venture the subversion of their Peace and their Order which are certain Goods for the propagation of uncertain or contested Opinions One of the great Causes of the first Revolt in the Low-Countreys appeared to be The Oppression of men's Consciences or Persecution in their Liberties their Estates and their Lives upon pretence of Religion And this at a time when there seemed to be a conspiring-disposition in most Countreys of Christendom to seek the reformation of some abuses grown in the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church either by the Rust of Time by Negligence or by Human Inventions Passions and Interests The rigid opposition given at Rome to this general Humour was followed by a defection of mighty numbers in all those several Countreys Who professed to reform themselves according to such Rules as they thought were necessary for the reformation of the Church These persons though they agreed in the main of disowning the Papal Power and reducing Belief from the authority of Tradition to that of the Scripture Yet they differ'd much among themselves in other circumstances especially of Discipline according to the Perswasions and Impressions of the Leading-Doctors in their several Countreys So the Reformed of France became universally Calvinists But for those of Germany though they were generally Lutherans yet there was a great mixture both of Calvinists and Anabaptists among them The first Persecutions of these Reformed arose in Germany in the time of Charles the Fifth and drove great numbers of them down into the Seventeen Provinces especially Holland and Brabant where the Priviledges of the Cities were greater and the Emperor's Government was less severe as among the Subjects of his own Native Countreys This was the occasion that in the year 1566 when upon the first Insurrection in Flanders those of the Reformed Profession began to form Consistories and levy Contributions among themselves for support of their Common Cause It was resolved upon consultation among the Heads of them that for declining all differences among themselves at a time of common exigence The publique Profession of their Party should be that of the Lutherans though with liberty and indulgence to those of different Opinions By the Union of Utrecht concluded in 579 Each of the Provinces was left to order the matter of Religion as they thought fit and most conducing to the welfare of their Province With this provision that every man should remain free in his Religion and none be examined or entrapped for that cause according to the Pacification at Gant But in the year 583 it was enacted by general agreement That the Evangelical Religion should be only professed in all the Seven Provinces Which came thereby to be the establisht Religion of this State The Reasons which seem to induce them to this settlement were many and of weight As first Because by the Persecutions arrived in France where all the Reformed were Calvinists multitudes of people had retired out of that Kingdom into the Low Countreys And by the great commerce and continual intercourse with England where the Reformation agreed much with the Calvinists in point of Doctrine though more with the Lutherans in point of Discipline Those Opinions came to be credited and propagated more than any other among the people of these Provinces So as the numbers were grown to be greater far in the Cities of this than of any other Profession Secondly The Succours and Supplies both of Men and Money by which the weak Beginnings of this Commonwealth were Perserved and Fortified came chiefly from England from the Protestants of France when their affairs were successful and from the Calvinist Princes of Germany who lay nearest and were readiest to relieve them In the next place Because those of this Profession seem'd the most contrary and violent against the Spaniards who made themselves Heads of the Roman-Catholiques throughout Christendom And the hatred of Spain and their Dominion was so rooted in the Hearts of this People that it had influence upon them in the very choice of their Religion And lastly Because by this Profession all Rights and Jurisdiction of the Clergy or Hierarchy being suppressed There was no Ecclesiastical Authority left to rise up and trouble or fetter the Civil Power And all the Goods and Possessions of Churches and Abbies were seized wholly into the hands of the State which made a great encrease of the publique Revenue A thing the most necessary for the support of their Government There might perhaps be added one Reason more which was particular to one of the Provinces For whereas in most if not all other parts of Christendom the Clergy composed one of the Three Estates of the Countrey And thereby shar'd with the Nobles and Commons in their Influences upon the Government That Order never made any part of the Estates in Holland nor had any Vote in their Assembly which consisted only of the Nobles and the Cities and this Province bearing always the greatest sway in the Councils of the Union was most enclined to the settlement of that Profession which gave least pretence of Power or Jurisdiction to the Clergy and so agreed most with their own ancient Constitutions Since this Establishment as well as before the great Care of this State has ever been To favour no particular or curious Inquisition into the Faith or Religious Principles of any peaceable man who came to live under the protection of their Laws And to suffer no Violence or Oppression upon any Mans Conscience whose Opinions broke not out into Expressions or Actions of ill consequence to the State A free Form of Government either making way for more freedom in Religion Or else having newly contended so far themselves for Liberty in this point they thought it the more unreasonable for them to oppress others Perhaps while they were so threatened and endanger'd by Forreign Armies they thought it the more necessary to provide against Discontents within which can never be dangerous where they are not grounded or fathered upon Oppression in point either of Religion or Liberty But in those two Cases the Flame often proves most violent in a State the more 't is shut up or the longer concealed The Roman-Catholique Religion was alone excepted from the common protection of their Laws Making Men as the States believed worse Subjects than the rest By the acknowledgment of a Forreign and Superior Jurisdiction For so must all Spiritual Power needs be as grounded upon greater Hopes and Fears than any Civil At least wherever the perswasions from Faith are as strong as those
mutual trust among private men so it cannot grow or thrive to any great degree without a confidence both of publique and private safety and consequently a trust in the Government from an opinion of its Strength Wisdom and Justice Which must be grounded either upon the Personal Virtues and Qualities of a Prince or else upon the Constitutions and Orders of a State It appears to every mans eye who hath travel'd Holland and observed the number and vicinity of their great and populous Towns and Villages with the prodigious improvement of almost every spot of ground in the Countrey And the great multitudes constantly employ'd in their Shipping abroad and their Boats at home That no other known Countrey in the World of the same extent holds any proportion with this in numbers of people And if that be the great foundation of Trade the best account that can be given of theirs will be by considering the Causes and Accidents that have served to force or invite so vast a confluence of people into their Countrey In the first rank may be placed the Civil-Wars Calamities Persecutions Oppressions or Discontents that have been so fatal to most of their Neighbours for some time before as well as since their State began The Persecutions for matter of Religion in Germany under Charles the Fifth in France under Henry the Second and in England under Queen Mary forced great numbers of people out of all those Countreys to shelter themselves in the several Towns of the Seventeen Provinces where the ancient Liberties of the Countrey and Priviledges of the Cities had been inviolate under so long a succession of Princes and gave protection to these oppressed strangers who fill'd their Cities both with People and Trade and raised Antwerp to such a heighth and renown as continued till the Duke of Alva's arrival in the Low-Countreys The fright of this man and the Orders he brought and Armies to execute them began to scatter the Flock of people that for some time had been nested there So as in very few Months above a Hundred thousand Families removed out of the Countrey But when the Seven Provinces united and began to defend themselves with success under the conduct of the Prince of Orange and the countenance of England and France And the Persecutions for Religion began to grow sharp in the Spanish Provinces All the Professors of the Reformed Religion and haters of the Spanish Dominion retir'd into the strong Cities of this Commonwealth and gave the same date to the growth of Trade there and the decay of it at Antwerp The long Civil-Wars at first of France then of Germany and lastly of England serv'd to encrease the swarm in this Countrey not only by such as were persecuted at home but great numbers of peaceable men who came here to seek for quiet in their Lives and safety in their Possessions or Trades Like those Birds that upon the approach of a rough Winter-season leave the Countreys where they were born and bred flye away to some kinder and softer Climate and never return till the Frosts are past and the Winds are laid at home The invitation these people had to fix rather in Holland than in many better Countreys seems to have been at first the great strength of their Towns which by their Maritime scituation and the low flatness of their Countrey can with their Sluces overflow all the ground about them at such distances as to become inaccessible to any Land-Forces And this natural strength has been improv'd especially at Amsterdam by all the Art and Expence that could any ways contribute towards the defence of the place Next was the Constitution of their Government by which neither the States-General nor the Prince have any power to invade any man's Person or Property within the precincts of their Cities Nor could it be fear'd that the Senate of any Town should conspire to any such violence nor if they did could they possibly execute it having no Soldiers in their pay and the Burgers only being employ'd in the defence of their Towns and execution of all Civil Justice among them These Circumstances gave so great a credit to the Bank of Amsterdam And that was another invitation for people to come and lodg here what part of their Money they could transport and knew no way of securing at home Nor did those people only lodg Moneys here who came over into the Countrey but many more who never left their own Though they provided for a retreat or against a storm and thought no place so secure as this nor from whence they might so easily draw their money into any parts of the World Another Circumstance was the general Liberty and Ease not only in point of Conscience but all others that serve to the commodiousness and quiet of life Every man following his own way minding his own business and little enquiring into other mens Which I suppose happen'd by so great a concourse of people of several Nations different Religions and Customs as left nothing strange or new And by the general humour bent all upon Industry whereas Curiosity is only proper to idle men Besides it has ever been the great Principle of their State running through all their Provinces and Cities even with emulation To make their Countrey the common refuge of all miserable men From whose protection hardly any Alliance Treaties or Interests have ever been able to divert or remove them So as during the great dependance this State had upon France in the time of Henry the Fourth All the persons disgraced at that Court or banisht that Countrey made this their common retreat Nor could the State ever be prevail'd with by any instances of the French Ambassadors to refuse them the use and liberty of common life and air under the protection of their Government This firmness in the State has been one of the circumstances that has invited so many unhappy men out of all their Neighbourhood and indeed from most parts of Europe to shelter themselves from the blows of Justice or of Fortune Nor indeed does any Countrey seem so proper to be made use of upon such occasions not only in respect of safety but as a place that holds so constant and easie correspondencies with all parts of the World And whither any man may draw whatever money he has at his disposal in any other place Where neither Riches expose men to danger nor Poverty to contempt But on the contrary where Parsimony is honourable whether it be necessary or no and he that is forced by his Fortune to live low may here alone live in fashion and upon equal terms in appearance abroad with the chiefest of their Ministers and richest of their Merchants Nor is it easily imagin'd how great an effect this Constitution among them may in course of time have had upon the encrease both of their People and their Trade As the two first invitations of people into this Countrey were the strength of their
Towns and nature of their Government So two others have grown with the course of time and progress of their Riches and Power One is the Reputation of their Government arising from the observation of the Success of their Arms the Prudence of their Negotiations the Steddiness of their Counsels the Constancy of their Peace and Quiet at home and the Consideration they hereby arrived at among the Princes and States of Christendom From all these men grew to a general opinion of the Wisdom and Conduct of their State and of its being establisht upon Foundations that could not be shaken by any common Accidents nor consequently in danger of any great or sudden Revolutions And this is a mighty inducement to industrious people to come and inhabit a Countrey who seek not only safety under Laws from Injustice and Oppression but likewise under the strength and good conduct of a State from the violence of Forreign Invasions or of Civil Commotions The other is the great Beauty of their Countrey forced in time and by the improvements of Industry in spight of Nature Which draws every day such numbers of curious and idle persons to see their Provinces though not to inhabit them And indeed their Countrey is a much better Mistress than a Wife and where few persons who are well at home would be content to live but where none that have time and money to spare would not for once be willing to travel And as England shows in the beauty of the Countrey what Nature can arrive at so does Holland in the number greatness and beauty of their Towns whatever Art can bring to pass But these and many other matters of Speculation among them filling the Observations of all common Travellers shall make no part of mine whose design is rather to discover the Causes of their Trade and Riches than to relate the Effects Yet it may be noted hereupon as a piece of wisdom in any Kingdom or State By the Magnificence of Courts or of Publique Structures By encouraging beauty in private Buildings and the adornment of Towns with pleasant and regular plantations of Trees By the celebration of some Noble Festivals or Solemnities By the institution of some great Marts or Fairs and by the contrivance of any extraordinary and renowned Spectacles To invite and occasion as much and as often as can be the concourse of busie or idle people from the neighbouring or remoter Nations whose very passage and intercourse is a great encrease of Wealth and of Trade and a secret incentive of people to inhabit a Countrey where men may meet with equal advantages and more entertainments of life than in other places Such were the Olimpick and other Games among the Grecians Such the Triumphs Trophees and Secular Plays of old Rome as well as the Spectacles exhibited afterwards by the Emperors with such stupendious effects of Art and Expence for courting or entertertaining the people Such the Jubilees of new Rome The Justs and Tournaments formerly used in most of the Courts of Christendom The Festivals of the more celebrated Orders of Knighthood And in particular Towns the Carnavals and Faires The Kirmeshes which run through all the Cities of the Netherlands and in some of them with a great deal of Pageantry as well as Traffique being equal baits of Pleasure and of Gain Having thus discover'd what has laid the great Foundations of their Trade by the multitude of their People which has planted and habituated Industry among them and by that all sorts of Manufacture As well as Parsimony and thereby general Wealth I shall enumerate very briefly some other Circumstances that seem next to these the chief Advancers and Encouragers of Trade in their Countrey Low Interest and deerness of Land are effects of the multitude of People and cause so much Money to lye ready for all Projects by which gain may be expected as the cutting of Canals making Bridges and Cawsies leveling Downs and draining Marshes besides all new essays at Forreign Trade which are proposed with any probability of advantage The use of their Banks which secures Money and makes all Payments easie and Trade quick The Sale by Registry which was introduced here and in Flanders in the time of Charles the Fifth and makes all Purchases safe The Severity of Justice not only against all Thefts but all Cheats and Counterfeits of any Publique Bills which is capital among them and even against all common Beggars who are disposed of either into Work-houses or Hospitals as they are able or unable to labour The Convoys of Merchant-Fleets into all parts even in time of Peace but especially into the Streights which give their Trade security against many unexpected accidents and their Nation credit abroad and breeds up Sea-men for their Ships of War The lowness of their Customs and easiness of paying them which with the freedom of their Ports invite both Strangers and Natives to bring Commodities hither not only as to a Market but as to a Magazine where they lodg till they are invited abroad to other and better Markets Order and Exactness in managing their Trade which brings their Commodities in credit abroad This was first introduced by severe Laws and Penalties but is since grown into custom Thus there have been above Thirty several Placarts about the manner of curing pickling and barreling Herrings Thus all Arms made at Utrecht are forfeited if sold without mark or marked without trial And I observed in their Indian-House that all the pieces of Scarlet which are sent in great quantities to those parts are marked with the English Arms and Inscriptions in English by which they maintain the credit gain'd to that Commodity by our former trade to parts where 't is now lost or decay'd The Government manag'd either by men that trade or whose Families have risen by it or who have themselves some Interest going in other men's Traffique or who are born and bred in Towns The soul and beeing whereof consists wholly in Trade Which makes sure of all favour that from time to time grows necessary and can be given it by the Government The custom of every Towns affecting some particular Commerce or Staple valuing it self thereupon and so improving it to the greatest heighth as Flussingue by that of the West-Indies Middleburgh of French-Wines Terveer by the Scotch Staple Dort by the English Staple and Rhenish-Wines Rotterdam by the Rnglish and Scotch Trade at large and by French-Wines Leyden by the Manufacture of all sorts of Stuffs Silk Hair Gold and Silver Haerlem by Linnen Mixt-Stuffs and Flowers Delf by Beer and Dutch-Purcelane Surdam by the built of Ships Enchusyen and Mazlandsluys by Herring-fishing Friezland by the Greenland-Trade and Amsterdam by that of the East-Indies Spain and the Streights The great application of the whole Province to the Fishing-Trade upon the Coasts of England and Scotland which employs an incredible number of Ships and Sea-men and supplies most of the Southern parts of Europe with a rich and
necessary Commodity The last I shall mention is the mighty advance they have made towards engrossing the whole Commerce of the East-Indies by their successes against the Porteguesses and by their many Wars and Victories against the Natives whereby they have forced them to Treaties of Commerce exclusive to all other Nations and to the admission of Forts to be built upon Streights and Passes that command the entrances into the Traffique of such places This has been atchieved by the multitude of their people and Mariners that has been able to furnish every year so many great Ships for such Voyages and to supply the loss of so many lives as the changes of Climate have cost before they learnt the method of living in them By the vastness of the Stock that has been turn'd wholly to that Trade And by the conduct and application of the East-Indy Company who have managed it like a Commonwealth rather than a Trade And thereby raised a State in the Indies governed indeed by the Orders of the Company but otherwise appearing to those Nations like a Soveraign State making War and Peace with their greatest Kings and able to bring to Sea Forty or Fifty Men of War and Thirty thousand men at Land by the modestest computations The Stock of this Trade besides what it turns to in France Spain Italy the Streights and Germany makes them so great Masters in the Trade of the Northern parts of Europe as Muscovy Poland Pomerania and all the Baltique where the Spices that are an Indian-Drug and Europaean-Luxury command all the Commodities of those Countreys which are so necessary to life as their â—ora and to Navigation as Hemp Pitch Masts Planks and Iron Thus the Trade of this Countrey is discover'd to be no effect of common contrivances of natural dispositions or scituations or of trivial accidents But of a great concurrence of Circumstances a long course of Time force of Orders and Method which never before met in the World to such a degree or with so prodigious a Success and perhaps never will again Having grown to sum up all from the scituation of their Countrey extended upon the Sea divided by two such Rivers as the Rhyne and the Mose with the vicinity of the Ems Weser and Elve From the confluence of people out of Flanders England France and Germany invited by the Strength of their Towns and by the Constitutions and Credit of their Government by the Liberty of Conscience and Security of Life and Goods subjected only to constant Laws From general Industry and Parsimony occasion'd by the multitude of People and smalness of Countrey From cheapness and easiness of Carriage by convenience of Canals From low Use and deerness of Land which turn Money to Trade The institution of Banks Sale by Registry Care of Convoys Smalness of Customs Freedom of Ports Order in Trade Interest of persons in the Government Particular Traffique affected to particular places Application to the Fishery And Acquisitions in the East-Indies It is no constant Rule That Trade makes Riches For there may be a Trade that impoverishes a Nation As it is not going often to Market that enriches the Countrey-man But on the contrary if every time he comes there he buys to a greater value than he sells He grows the poorer the oftner he goes But the only and certain Scale of Riches arising from Trade in a Nation is the proportion of what is exported for the consumption of others to what is imported for their own The true ground of this proportion lies in the general Industry and Parsimony of a people or in the contrary of both Industry encreases the Native Commodity either in the product of the Soil or the Manufactures of the Countrey which raises the Stock for exportation Parsimony lessens the consumption of their own as well as of Forreign Commodities and not only abates the importation by the last but encreases the exportation by the first For of all Native Commodities the less is consumed in a Countrey the more is exported abroad there being no Commodity but at one price or other will find a Market which They will be Masters of who can afford it cheapest Such are always the most industrious and parsimonious people who can thrive by Prices upon which the Lazy and Expensive cannot live The vulgar mistake That importation of Forreign Wares if purchased abroad with Native Commodities and not with Money does not make a Nation poorer Is but what every man that gives himself leisure to think must immediately rectifie By finding out that upon the end of an Account between a Nation and all they deal with abroad Whatever the Exportation wants in value to balance that of the Importation must of necessity be made up with ready money By this we find out the foundation of the Riches of Holland As of their Trade by the circumstances already rehearsed For never any Countrey traded so much and consumed so little They buy infinitely but 't is to sell again either upon improvement of the Commodity or at a better Market They are the great Masters of the Indian Spices and of the Persian Silks but wear plain Woollen and feed upon their own Fish and Roots Nay they sell the finest of their own Cloath to France and buy coarse out of England for their own wear They send abroad the best of their own Butter into all parts and buy the cheapest out of Ireland or the North of England for their own use In short they furnish infinite Luxury which they never practise and traffique in Pleasures which they never taste The Gentlemen and Officers of the Army change their Clothes and their Modes like their Neighbours But among the whole Body of the Civil Magistrates the Merchants the rich Traders and Citizens in general the Fashions continue still the same And others as constant among the Sea-men and Boors So that men leave off their Clothes only because they are worn out and not because they are out of fashion Their great Forreign Consumption is French-Wine and Brandy But that may be allow'd them as the only Reward they enjoy of all their pains and as that alone which makes them rich and happy in their voluntary Poverty who would otherwise seem poor and wretched in their real Wealth Besides what they spend in Wine they save in Corn to make other Drinks which is bought from Forreign parts And upon a pressure of their Affairs we see now for two years together They have deni'd themselves even this Comfort among all their Sorrows and made up in passive Fortitude whatever they have wanted in the active Thus it happens that much going constantly out either in Commodity or in the Labour of Seafaring-men And little coming in to be consumed at home The rest returns in Coin and fills the Countrey to that degree That more Silver is seen in Holland among the common Hands and Purses than Brass either in Spain or in France Though one be so rich in the
Ministers seemed either to decline or to restrain it On the other side the Prince grew confident upon the former Promises or at least Intimations of Holland and the concurring dispositions of the other Six Provinces to his advancement And his Party spirited by their hopes and the great Qualities of this young Prince now grown ripe for Action and for Enterprise resolved to bring this point to a sudden decision Against which the other Party prepared and united all their Defences So as this strong Disease that had been so long working in the very Bowels of the State seem'd just upon its Crisis When a Conjunction of two Mighty Kings brought upon them a sudden and furious Invasion by Land and Sea at the same time By a Royal Fleet of above Fourscore Ships and an Army of as many thousand men When the States saw this Cloud ready to break upon them after a long belief that it would blow over They began not only to provide shelter at home with their usual vigor but to look out for it abroad though both too late Of the Princes that were their Allies or concern'd in their danger Such as were far off could not be in time The nearer were unwilling to share in a danger they were not enough prepar'd for Most were content to see the Pride of this State humbled Some the Injuries they had received from them revenged Many would have them mortified that would not have them destroyed And so all resolved to leave them to weather the storm as they could for one Campania Which they did not believe could go far towards their ruin considering the greatness of their Riches number of their Forces and strength of their Places The State in the mean time had encreased their Troops to Seventy thousand men and had begun to repair the Fortifications of their Frontier-Towns But so great a length of their Countrey lay open to the French Invasion by the Territories of Colen and Liege And to the Bishop of Munster their inveterate Enemy by Westphalia that they knew not where to expect or provide against the first danger And while they divided their Forces and Endeavours towards the securing of so many Garrisons They provided for none to any purpose but Maestricht Which the French left behind them and fell in upon the Towns of the Rhine and the heart of their Provinces Besides Those Ministers who had still the direction of Affairs bent their chief application to the strength and order of their Fleet rather than of their Army Whether more peckt at England than France upon the War and manner of entering into it Or believing that a Victory at Sea would be the way to a Peace with this Crown Or hoping their Towns would not fall so fast but that before three or four were lost the business at Sea would be decided Or perhaps content that some ill Successes should attend the Prince of Orange at his first entrance upon the Command of their Armies and thereby contribute to their Designs of restraining the Authority while they were forced to leave him the Name of Captain-General This indeed was not likely to fail considering the ill constitution of their old Army the hasty Levies of their new and the heighth of the Factions now broken out in the State Which left both the Towns and the Troops in suspence under whose Banners they fought and by whose Orders they were to be govern'd the Prince's or the States There happen'd at the same time an accident unusual to their Climate Which was a mighty Drowth in the begining of the Summer that left their waters fordable in places where they used to be navigable for Boats of greatest burthen And this gave them more trouble and distraction in the defence as their Enemies more facility in the passage of those great Rivers which were esteemed no small security of their Countrey And in this posture were the Affairs of this Commonwealth when the War broke out with those fatal Events that must needs attend any Kingdom or State where the violence of a Forreign Invasion happens to meet with the distraction of a Domestique Sedition or Discontent Which like ill Humours in a Body make any small wound dangerous and a great one mortal They were still a great Body but without their usual Soul They were a State but it was of the Disunited Provinces Their Towns were without Order Their Burgers without Obedience Their Soldiers without Discipline And all without heart Whereas in all Sieges The Hearts of Men defend the Walls and not Walls the Men And indeed it was the Name of England joining in the War against them that broke their hearts and contributed more to the loss of so many Towns and so much Countrey than the Armies of Munster or of France So that upon all circumstances consider'd it seems easier to give an account what it was that lost them so much than what sav'd them the rest No man at play sees a very great Game either in his own or another's hand unexpectedly lost but He is apt to consider whether it could have been saved and how it ought to have been play'd The same Enquiry will be natural upon the fall of this State and very difficult to resolve After the mighty growth of the French and decay of the Spanish Power which drew on the Invasion of Flanders in 1667 This State had a very hard Game to play Either they must see Flanders wholly lost and France grown to confine upon them whom they liked as an Ally but dreaded as a Neighbour Or else they must join with France to divide Flanders between them But they knew what it was to share with the Lion Or they must join with Spain to defend Flanders against France That is with their old Enemy against their old Friend Or lastly They must join with England for the defence of Flanders Neither breaking with France nor closing with Spain and frame an Arbitrage but of something a rough nature Rather prescribing than mediating a Peace And threatning a War upon that Crown that refused it They chose the last and wisely as all men thought But though this Alliance was happily planted yet it was unhappily cultivated and so the Fruit came to fall and the Root to wither upon the first change of seasons in such a manner and to such a degree as we have lately seen Whether they could have prevented a Conjunction of England with France shall be no part of my Subject For I pretend not to know or to tell Secrets of State and intend these not for the Observations of an Ambassador but of a private man as I am and such as any Gentleman might easily have made who had resided above two years as I did in Holland and had been as I was a little enclined to observe I shall only say That the Conjunction of England with France was to this State like one of those Diseases which the Physicians say are hard to discern while they