History of Protestantism in the Netherlands - James Aitken Wylie

distasteful to Granvelle. He could tell beforehand
the remedy which the convention would prescribe
for the popular discontent. The convention, he felt
assured, would demand the cancelling of the edicts,
the suppression of the Inquisition, and the revival
of those charters under which civil liberty and
commercial enterprise had reached that palmy state
in which the Emperor Charles had found them
when he entered the Netherlands. Granvelle
accordingly wrote to his master counselling him
not to call a meeting of the States. The advice of
the cardinal but too well accorded with the views
of Philip. Instead of summoning a convention the
king sent orders to the regent to see that the edicts
were more vigorously executed. It was not
gentleness but rigour, he said, that was needed for
these turbulent subjects.
Things were taking an ominous turn. The king's
letter showed plainly to the Prince of Orange, and
Counts Egmont and Horn, that Philip was resolved
at all hazards to carry out his grand scheme against
the independence of the Provinces. Not one of the
edicts would he cancel; and so long as they
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