[_INTERNAL REFORMS_] Some of these measures might have been quite justified, and the example of Maria Theresa shows that they might have been taken progressively, under favourable circumstances, without causing trouble. What hurt the people most was their sweeping character, their frequency and the petty tyranny with which they were applied. It was not without reason that Frederick II of Prussia nicknamed Joseph "my brother the sacristan." The emperor had gone as far as replacing the Catholic brotherhoods by the "Brotherhood of the Active Love of My Neighbour." All protests remained without the least result. They were merely, according to Joseph II, "the effect of delirium." Within five years, this too sensible sovereign, by calling all those who did not agree with him "madmen," had succeeded in undoing all the good work undertaken by Charles de Lorraine and in ruining Austrian authority in the Netherlands. In 1786 Joseph II undertook to regulate the people's pleasures. In order to prevent the inhabitants of neighbouring villages and towns from taking part in each other's kermesses, he fixed one day in the year for the celebration of all these festivities. No wonder that his good intentions were not appreciated and that this constant interference of the State in the people's most intimate and cherished traditions was met with growing dislike. The emperor, nevertheless, did not slacken his activity, and the next year issued a decree which completely upset the administrative and judicial organization of the provinces. A "General Council of the Low Countries" replaced the three collateral Councils. The country was divided into nine circles, under the authority of intendants, each of which was subdivided into districts under the authority of commissaries. All supreme courts, provincial, municipal, ecclesiastical, university and corporation courts were replaced, from one day to another, by sixty-four ordinary tribunals, two courts of appeal and one court of revision.