She was herself a woman of wide erudition, and her fame as a poet was such as to win for her, according to the fashion of the day, the title of “the Dutch Sappho.”  Tesselschade, ten years younger than her sister and educated under her fostering care, was however destined to eclipse her, alike by her personal charms and her varied accomplishments.  If one could believe all that is said in her praise by Hooft, Huyghens, Barlaeus, Brederoo, Vondel and Cats, she must indeed have been a very marvel of perfect womanhood.  As a singer she was regarded as being without a rival; and her skill in painting, carving, etching on glass and tapestry work was much praised by her numerous admirers.  Her poetical works, including her translation into Dutch verse of Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata, have almost all unfortunately perished, but a single ode that survives—­“the Ode to a Nightingale”—­is an effort not unworthy of Shelley and shows her possession of a true lyrical gift.  At Muiden the presence of the “beautiful” Tesselschade was almost indispensable.  “What feast would be complete,” wrote Hooft to her, “at which you were not present?  Favour us then with your company if it be possible”; and again:  “that you will come is my most earnest desire.  If you will but be our guest, then, I hope, you will cure all our ills.”  He speaks of her to Barlaeus as “the priestess”; and it is clear that at her shrine all the frequenters of Muiden were ready to burn the incense of adulation.  Both Anna and Tesselschade, like their father, were devout Catholics.

Anna Maria van Schuurman (1607-84) was a woman of a different type.  She does not seem to have loved or to have shone in society, but she was a very phenomenon of learning.  She is credited with proficiency in painting, carving and other arts; but it is not on these, so to speak, accessory accomplishments that her fame rests, but on the extraordinary range and variety of her solid erudition.  She was at once linguist, scholar, theologian, philosopher, scientist and astronomer.  She was a remarkable linguist and had a thorough literary and scholarly knowledge of French, English, German, Italian, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Syriac, Chaldee, Arabic and Ethiopic.  Her reputation became widespread; and, in the latter part of her long life, many strangers went to Utrecht, where she resided, to try to get a glimpse of so great a celebrity, which was not easy owing to her aversion to such visits.

Turning to the domain of mathematical and physical science and of scientific research and discovery, we find that here also the 17th century Netherlanders attained the highest distinction.  As mathematicians Simon Stevin, the friend and instructor of Maurice of Orange, and Francis van Schooten, the Leyden Professor, who numbered among his pupils Christian Huyghens and John de Witt, did much excellent work in the earlier years of the century.  The published writings of De Witt on “the properties of curves” and on “the theory of probabilities” show