[64] Holland was detached from the Low Countries in 1579. Antwerp stood on Spanish territory on the very confines of Holland. Philip IV. made every possible effort to subdue Holland, and did not give over till the Treaty of Westphalia, which established its independence in 1648, one year before the decapitation of Charles I.
[65] This expression occurs again, Century x. quatrain 7: “L’Isle Britanne par vin sel en soucy.” Wine figuratively standing for heat and courage, or force; whilst salt may represent wisdom, for its incorruptibility as well as wit for its pungency.
[66] Macelin; Latin, marcellum; Italian, marcellaio, butcher.
[67] 1588 is the date of the destruction of Philip II.’s Invincible Armada by storms and by Drake in Cadiz Bay. From that time the maritime supremacy of England dates, and, according to Nostradamus, it is to last more than three centuries, but not four. It culminated with the death of Nelson at Trafalgar, and the tale of that event still stirs the soul to heroism, and to that still more sacred thing, a sense profound of duty. But all that has happened since seems like a slow toning down to gradual nothingness. In four years the bare three centuries will stand completed. An Englishman may ask, I think, with some emotion, how much the plus stands for.
[68] This paper is the substance of a sermon preached in the parish church of St. Mary, Tenby, on Sunday, September 6, 1884, before the Congress of the British Archæological Association, from the text Jeremiah vi. 16: “Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”
[69] Mr. Gladstone.
[70] Max Müller, “Science of Religion.”
[71] “Plutarch: His Life, his Lives, and his Morals,” by Archbishop Trench, p. 95.
[72] Discovered in 1779, now in the British Museum.
[73] A.D. 627.