And is it to be believed that he who for twenty years had sacrificed his repose, lavished his fortune, and risked his life, for the public cause, now aimed at absolute dominion, or coveted a despotism which all his actions prove him to have abhorred? Defeated bigotry has put forward such vapid accusations. He has been also held responsible for the early cruelties which, it is notorious, he used every means to avert, and frequently punished. But while these revolting acts can only be viewed in the light of reprisals against the bloodiest persecution that ever existed, by exasperated men driven to vengeance by a bad example, not one single act of cruelty or bad faith has ever been made good against William, who may be safely pronounced one of the wisest and best men that history has held up as examples to the species. The authority of one author has been produced to prove that, during the lifetime of his brother Louis, offers were made to him by France of the sovereignty of the northern provinces, on condition of the southern being joined to the French crown. That he ever accepted those offers is without proof; that he never acted on them is certain. But he might have been justified in purchasing freedom for those states which had so well earned it, at the price even of a qualified independence under another power, to the exclusion of those which had never heartily struggled against Spain. The best evidence, however, of William's real views is to be found in the Capitulation, as it is called; that is to say, the act which was on the point of being executed between him and the states, when a base fanatic, instigated by a bloody tyrant, put a period to his splendid career. This capitulation exists at full length, but was never formally executed. Its conditions are founded on the same principles, and conceived in nearly the same terms, as those accepted by the duke of Anjou; and the whole compact is one of the most thoroughly liberal that history has on record. The prince repaired to Delft for the ceremony of his inauguration, the price of his long labors; but there, instead of anticipated dignity, he met the sudden stroke of death.