The end of De Witt’s political career was disastrous, and it is not easy to assign to him his proper place among the statesmen of the world. I think, however, it should be on the whole a high one; as to actual work done, he merely showed that Holland could maintain her proud position independently of the House of Orange. The great men of that House, who came before and after him, under whom the United Provinces were created a nation, and obtained a world-wide renown, under whom, in a death-struggle with first one and then the other, they successfully resisted all the strength of the two mightiest monarchies in the world—those Princes, William the Silent, Maurice, and William III., have thrown De Witt rather into the shade. It is only when we take into account the difficulties he had to contend with that his rare abilities become fully apparent. One of his biographers has invidiously compared his character with that of Cromwell, who led a rival Republic at about the same time. But it seems to me that there are no materials for a comparison; what De Witt might have done as the all-powerful chief of a large and well-disciplined army is an unknown quantity. On the other hand, how would the great Protector, with his irritable temper and his unintelligible speeches, have succeeded in doing the work of De Witt? We must remember that Cromwell at the most critical period only saved himself and his country by turning out half his Parliament into the street. He cut the Gordian knot; while De Witt was compelled to be continually untying it. There is a good simile, supposed to have been used by an illustrious statesman of the present day as regards his own position, but far less applicable to him than to the Pensionary: ‘De Witt was like a man out hunting upon a mule.’
C.
INDEX OF PORTRAITS.
