that the states-general, finding the pernicious doctrines and practice of the Jesuits at variance with the principles of loyalty and decorum which distinguished the other orders of the catholic priesthood, and that their intrigues were even destructive to the pure exercise of the religion they themselves disgraced, put in force against them the ancient statutes, justified by more than a century of atrocious misconduct on their part and great forbearance on that of the country.'

*

The tranquillity enjoyed by the United Provinces during this long period, did not find a parallel in those portions of Belgium which were formally delivered up to the emperor, in 1716, in conformity with the first article of the treaty of the Barrier. From the causes before mentioned, the discontent of the people was considerable; and recent researches in the archives of Brussels have brought to light a correspondence of the marquis de Prié, the first Austrian governor, which establishes the fact, that it was by extreme severity and overwhelming precautions that a general revolt was prevented.

The succeeding governors of Belgium from this epoch till the accession of Maria Theresa, - a period of fifteen years, appear to have experienced no difficulty in the management of the country. An honourable obscurity gives its negative testimony to the moderation of their measures. We hear no more of revolts or executions. And whatever may have been the early repugnance of the Belgian people to the Austrian domi nation, we may safely assert that they became gradually reconciled to it; until at length the benevolent reign of the sovereign just named, and the deep sympathy excited by her heroism, converted the Netherland population into faithful and devoted subjects of the imperial power.

The peace of Europe was once more disturbed in

See the remarkable letter of the bishop of Utrecht to pope Benedict XIV., dated February 13. 1758.

† See Dewez, 2d edit. tom. vii. p. 109.

1743.

MARIA THERESA.

307

1733. Poland, Germany, France, and Spain, were all embarked in the new war. Holland and England stood aloof; and another family alliance of great consequence drew still closer than ever the bonds of union between them. The young prince of Orange, who in 1728, had been elected stadtholder of Groningen and Guelders, in addition to that of Friesland, which dignity had been enjoyed by his father, had in the year 1734 married the princess Anne, daughter of George II. of England; and, by such a connection adding greatly to the consideration of the house of Nassau, had opened a field for the recovery of all its old distinctions.

The death of the emperor Charles VI., in October, 1740, left his daughter, the archduchess Maria Theresa, heiress of his throne and possessions. Young, beautiful, and endowed with qualities of the highest order, she was surrounded with enemies whose envy and ambition would have despoiled her of her splendid rights. Frederic of Prussia, surnamed the Great, in honour of his abilities rather than his sense of justice, the electors of Bavaria and Saxony, and the kings of Spain and Sardinia, all pressed forward to the spoliation of an inheritance which they seemed to consider as fair game for all comers. But Maria Theresa, first joining her husband, duke Francis of Lorraine, in her sovereignty, but without prejudice to it, under the title of co-regent, took an attitude truly heroic. When every thing seemed to threaten the dismemberment of her states, she threw herself upon the generous fidelity of her Hungarian subjects, with a dignified resolution that has few examples. There was imperial grandeur even in her appeal to their compassion. The results were electrical; and the whole tide of fortune was rapidly turned.

England and Holland were the first to come to the aid of the young and interesting empress. George II., at the head of his army, gained the victory of Dettingen, in support of her quarrel, in 1743; the states-general of the United Provinces having contributed 20,000

men and a large subsidy to her aid. Louis XV. resolved to throw his whole influence into the scale against these generous efforts in the princess's favour, influenced by the long-cherished desire to humble the imperial power; and he invaded the Austrian Netherlands in the following year. Marshal Saxe com

manded under the king, and at first carried every thing before him. Holland, having furnished 20,000 troops and six ships of war to George II. on the invasion of the young pretender, was little in a state to oppose any formidable resistance to the enemy that threatened her own frontiers. The republic, wholly attached for so long a period to pursuits of peace and commerce, had no longer good generals nor effective armies; nor could it even put a fleet of any importance to sea. Yet, with all these disadvantages, it would not yield to the threats or the demands of France; and it resolved to risk a new war, rather than succumb to an enemy it had once so completely subdued.

Conferences were opened at Breda, but interrupted almost as soon as commenced. Hostilities were renewed. The memorable battle of Fontenoy was offered and gloriously fought by the allies; accepted and splendidly won by the French. Never did the English and Dutch troops act more nobly in concert than in this remarkable engagement, which took place on the 11th of May, 1744. The valour of the French was not less conspicuous; and the success of the day was in great measure decided by the Irish battalions, sent by the lamentable politics of those and much later times, to swell the ranks and gain the battles of England's enemies. Marshal Saxe followed up his advantage the following year, taking Brussels and many other towns. Almost the whole of the Austrian Netherlands being now in the power of Louis XV., and the United Provinces again exposed to invasion and threatened with danger, they had once more recourse to the old expedient of the elevation of the house of Orange, which in times of imminent peril seemed to present a never

1751.

SEVEN YEARS' WAR.

309

failing palladium. Zealand was the first to give the impulsion; the other provinces soon followed the example; and William IV. was proclaimed stadtholder and captain-general, amidst almost unanimous rejoicings. These dignities were soon after declared hereditary, both in the male and female line of succession of the house of Orange Nassau.

*

The year 1748 brought the termination of the bril liant campaigns of marshal Saxe and the other generals of Louis XV. The treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, definitively signed on the 18th of October, put an end to hostilities: Maria Theresa was established in her Belgian possessions, as she had enjoyed them before the war. The United Provinces obtained the restitution of all the territory and towns which they had previously occupied in Dutch Flanders and Brabant; and Europe saw a fair balance of the nations which gave promise of security and peace. But the United Provinces, when scarcely recovering from struggles which had so checked their prosperity, were plunged in new and universal grief and anxiety by the death of their young stadtholder, which happened at the Hague, on the 13th of October, 1751. He had long been kept out of the government, though by no means deficient in the talents suited to his station. His son, William V., aged but three years and a half, succeeded him, under the guardianship of his mother, Anne of England, daughter of George II.; a princess represented to have possessed a proud and ambiticus temper, who immediately assumed a high tone of authority in the state.†

The seven years' war, which agitated the north of Europe, and deluged its plains with blood, was almost the only one in which the republic was able to preserve a strict neutrality. But this happy state

of tranquillity was not, as on former occasions, attended by that prodigious increase of commerce, and that accumulation of wealth, which had so often asto

nished the world. Differing with England on the policy which led the latter to weaken and humiliate France, jealousies sprang up between the two countries; and Dutch commerce became the object of the most vexatious and injurious efforts on the part of England. Remonstrance was vain; resistance impossible; and the decline of the republic hurried rapidly on. The Han seatic towns, the American colonies, the northern states of Europe, and France itself, all entered into the rivalry with Holland, in which, however, England carried off the most important prizes. Several private and petty encounters took place between the vessels of England and Holland, in consequence of the pretensions of the former to the right of search; and had the republic possessed the ability of former periods, and the talents of a Tromp or a De Ruyter, a new war would, no doubt, have been the result. But it was forced to submit ; and a degrading but irritating tranquillity was the consequence for several years; the national feelings receiving a faint consolation for home decline in some extension of colonial settlements in the east, in which the island of Ceylon was included.

In the midst of this inglorious state of things, and the domestic abundance which was the only compensation for the gradual loss of national influence, the installation of William V. in 1766; his marriage with the princess of Prussia, niece of Frederic the Great, in 1768; and the birth of two sons, the eldest on the 24th of August, 1772; successively took place. Magnificent fêtes celebrated these events; the satisfied citizens little imagining, amid their indolent rejoicings, the dismal futurity of revolution and distress which was silently but rapidly preparing for their country.

Maria Theresa, reduced to widowhood by the death of her husband, whom she had elevated in the year 1744 to the imperial dignity by the title of Francis I., continued to rule singly her vast possessions, and with such admirable propriety, that her name is to this day