which the absence of the sovereign had hitherto caused to the Low Countries.  The Catholic religion was declared that of the state, in its full integrity.  The provinces were guaranteed against dismemberment.  The archdukes, by which title the joint sovereigns were designated without any distinction of sex, were secured in the possession, with right of succession to their children; and a provision was added, that in default of posterity their possessions should revert to the Spanish crown.  The infanta Isabella soon sent her procuration to the archduke, her affianced husband, giving him full power and authority to take possession of the ceded dominions in her name as in his own; and Albert was inaugurated with great pomp at Brussels, on the 22d of August.  Having put everything in order for the regulation of the government during his absence, he set out for Spain for the purpose of accomplishing his spousals, and bringing back his bride to the chief seat of their joint power.  But before his departure he wrote to the various states of the republic, and to Prince Maurice himself, strongly recommending submission and reconciliation.  These letters received no answer; a new plot against the life of Prince Maurice, by a wretched individual named Peter Pann, having aroused the indignation of the country, and determined it to treat with suspicion and contempt every insidious proposition from the tyranny it defied.

Albert placed his uncle, the cardinal Andrew of Austria, at the head of the temporary government, and set out on his journey; taking the little town of Halle in his route, and placing at the altar of the Virgin, who is there held in particular honor, his cardinal’s hat as a token of his veneration.  He had not made much progress when he received accounts of the demise of Philip II., who died, after long suffering, and with great resignation, on the 13th of September, 1598, at the age of seventy-two.  Albert was several months on his journey through Germany; and the ceremonials of his union with the infanta did not take place till the 18th of April, 1599, when it was finally solemnized in the city of Valencia in Spain.

This transaction, by which the Netherlands were positively erected into a separate sovereignty, seems naturally to make the limits of another epoch in their history.  It completely decided the division between the northern and southern provinces, which, although it had virtually taken place long previous to this period, could scarcely be considered as formally consummated until now.  Here then we shall pause anew, and take a rapid review of the social state of the Netherlands during the last half century, which was beyond all doubt the most important period of their history, from the earliest times till the present.