LETTER IV.
That Country to which I am now to call your attention——I mean, the Netherlands——is marked by a greater number of political changes, and harrassed by a more continued train of military operations, than perhaps any Country in the records of Modern History. It may truly be called the Cockpit Royal of Europe, on which Tyrants, as ambition, avarice, pride, caprice, or malignity, prompted them, pitted thousands, and hundreds of thousands, of their fellow-creatures, to cut each other’s throats about some point, frivolous as regarding themselves, unimportant to Mankind, and only tending to gratify a diabolical lust for dominion: Yet, under all these disadvantages, (such are the natural qualities of this Country), it has, till lately, been in a tolerably flourishing state; and would, under good government and proper protection, equal any part of Europe for richness.
Flanders, Brabant, and the Country now called the United Netherlands, were in general known by the name of Netherlands, Low Countries, or Païs-bas, from their situation, as it is supposed, in respect of Germany. Anciently, they formed a part of Belgic Gaul, of which you may remember to have read an account in the Commentaries of Julius Cæsar, who describes the inhabitants as the most valiant of all the Gallic Nations——“Horum omnium Belgæ sunt fortissimi.” They afterwards were subject to petty Princes, and made part of the German Empire; and, in the sixteenth century, became subject to Charles the Fifth of the House of Austria; but, being oppressed beyond endurance by his son, Philip the Second of Spain, (that blind and furious bigot), they openly revolted——flew to arms to assert their freedom; and, after a struggle as glorious in effect as virtuous in principle——after performing prodigies of valour, and exhibiting examples of fortitude, to which none but men fighting in the Godlike Cause of Liberty are competent——led on by the wisdom and valour of the Prince of Orange, and assisted by the Sovereign of Great Britain——they at length so far succeeded, that those now called the United Netherlands, entered into a solemn league, and forced the gloomy Tyrant to acknowledge their independence. But that part to which I am now particularly to allude, continued annexed to the House of Austria. In 1787, they revolted, and made a temporary struggle to disengage themselves from the dominion of the Emperor; but, owing to some cabals among themselves, and the temperate conduct of that Prince, they again returned to their allegiance, and were rewarded with a general amnesty. In 1792, they were over-run by the French Army under General Dumourier——opened their arms to those Republicans, and were rewarded for it by oppression, tyranny, and injustice. The French, however, were driven back out of the Country; and, wonderful to relate, they again received their old Master, the Emperor, with strong demonstrations of joy, and manifested their loyalty and attachment to him by every expression that abject hypocrisy could suggest.
“O! how unlike their Belgic Sires of old!”
Here, could I stop with strict justice, I would——But, behold! the French again came; again they opened their gates to receive them; and again they were, with tenfold fury and rapacity, pillaged, oppressed, and insulted; and at the very time I am writing this, the Guillotine is doing its office——enforcing the payment of the most exorbitant and enormous contributions, and compelling, it is said, one hundred thousand of the ill-fated inhabitants to take the field, as soldiers of the Republic.
Human opinion is so chequered and uncertain, that two very honest men may in certain cases act in direct contradiction and hostility to each other, with the very best intentions——He, therefore, must have but a cold heart, and a contracted understanding, who cannot forgive the man that acts in such cases erroneously, when he acts from the exact dictates of his opinion, and upon the principle which he has conscientiously adopted: but when a whole People are seen whisking about with every gust of fortune, and making a new principle for every new point of convenience, we must despise them even when they happen to act right, and can scarcely afford them so much as pity in their calamities. The Austrian Netherlands are now in that state; and, without presuming to say in which of their tergiversations they were right, I will venture to pronounce that they deserve punishment, and I believe they are in hands very likely to give them their due.
To return——Ostend is a sea-port of Austrian Flanders, and is situated in the Liberty of Bruges. It was, at one time, the strongest town in Flanders: but a double ditch and ramparts, which constituted its strength, are now destroyed; and in the place where the former stood, docks, or rather basons, extremely capacious and commodious, are formed, for the reception of shipping. The ground about the town is very low and marshy, and cut into a number of fine canals——into some of which, ships of the largest size may enter——and in one of which, vessels of great burthen may ride, even close to Bruges. The harbour here is so fortunately circumstanced, that it was once thought, by Engineers, entirely secure from a blockade; and its pristine strength can in no way be so well described, as by a relation of the defence it made in the four first years of the seventeenth century——though, near the close of the sixteenth, it was no better than an insignificant fishing town. It held out against the Spaniards for three years, two months and sixteen days. Eighty thousand men lost their lives before it, while fifty thousand were killed or died within. It at last surrendered, but on good terms; and not for want of men or provisions, but for want of ground to stand on, which the enemy took from them, at an amazing loss, step by step, till they had not room left for men to defend it. Three hundred thousand cannon-balls, of thirty pounds weight each, were fired against it; and the besieged often filled up the breaches made in their ramparts with heaps of dead bodies.
Such, my dear boy, are the miracles that men, animated with the all-subduing spirit of Liberty, can perform——Liberty! that immediate jewel of the soul——that first moving principle of all the animal creation——which, with equal power, influences the bird to beat the cage with its wings, and the lion to tear the bars of his imprisonment——the infant to spring from the tender confinement of its nurse, and the lean and shrivelled pantaloon to crawl abroad, and fly the warmth and repose of his wholesome chamber——Liberty! which, for centuries enthralled by artifice and fraud, or lulled into a slumber by the witching spirit of Priest-craft, now rises like a giant refreshed with wine——in its great efforts for emancipation, destroys and overturns systems——but, when finding no resistance, and matured by time, will, I sincerely hope, sink appeased into a generous calm, and become the blessing, the guardian and protector of Mankind!
It is your good fortune, my dear children, to be born at a time when Liberty seems to be well understood in your own Country, and is universally the prevalent passion of men. It is almost needless, therefore, for me to exhort you to make it the groundwork of your political morality: but let me remind you to guard, above all, against the despotism of certain Tyrants, to whom many of the greatest advocates for Liberty are strangely apt to submit——I mean, your passions. Of all other Tyrants, they are the most subtle, the most bewitching, the most overbearing, and, what is worse, the most cruel. Beneath the domination of other Despots, tranquillity may alleviate the weight of your chains, and soften oppression; but when once you become the slave of your passions, your peace is for ever fled, and you live and die in unabating misery.