in the year 1576, when the successor of the Duke of Alva, Don Luis de Requesen (appointed in 1573), the Stadtholder commanding in the Southern Provinces, was killed. When pay was no longer given to the Spanish soldiers, they sought to remunerate themselves by plundering the country. In order to protect themselves against the brutality of the Spaniards, the Southern Provinces resolved to unite with the Northern. Thus the pacification of Ghent was brought about in the autumn of. 1576, in which the plan of a single State organization, embracing all the seventeen provinces, and guarding their provincial rights, was projected. The conse As regards religion, toleration was the fundamental idea established, if not equality of privileges for the Roman and Evangelical Confessions in all the Provinces. The actual accomplishment of this project appears to have been made more certain, when the Prince of Orange, not long afterwards, was clothed, through election by the States, with the almost dictatorial dignity of Ruward (Maintainer of the Peace) of Brabant. Spanish intrigue, alas, knew how to excite the peculiar interests of the provinces devoted to Catholicism, and to manage them so adroitly, that the Pacification of Ghent was again deserted by the Southern Provinces. Artois, Douai, and Hernegan formed themselves in January 5, 1579, into a new league, in which they bound themselves to support freedom in the Netherlands, but not to permit Protestant worship. quence of this was, that the seven Protestant Provinces, Gelderland, Zutphen, Zealand, Utrecht, Friesland, and Frisian Onmiellander, in accordance with the advice of the Prince of Orange, united in the "Union of Utrecht," January 23, 1579-the fundamental basis of the Netherland form of government down to this time-as a Protestant State, which separated completely from the Spanish authority in 1581. basis upon which this government rested, was the separate freedom of the Provinces, and their union for the good of the whole, and of Protestantism. Indeed, the latter was so important, that William justly declared, in his "Apology," that the Republic of the Netherlands could not hold together three days without holding on to the Reformation. Whilst now the Reformed Confession was actually the dominant one, it should have had the freest liberty. But unfortunately, in the political situation of the land, the thought gained ground, that an independent, self-governing Church was incompatible with a perfectly independent State. A Church ritual, which was published in 1576, under the authority of the Prince of Orange, guaranteed indeed to the Congregations the right of Presbyterial self-government and free ecclesiastical discipline, but conferred upon the Church no Synodal autonomy, because it was doubtful whether there could be two kinds of authority in a Congregation. When afterwards, at the first national Synod of Dortrecht, (1578), the effort was made to establish a complete, free Presbyterial Synodal organization, having its head in a National Synod (to meet every two or three years) as its supreme authority, this plan found no encouragement with the State authorities. At the Synod of Middleburg, (1581), the question of Church organization was again discussed. But the establishment of an independent, free Church organization was not obtained. It was limited to the establishment of Provincial organizations, by which the Presbyterial organization of the congregations in different portions of the State Church maintained many anomalous customs and practices. The disturbances with which the Church in the Netherlands were visited in the commencement of the Seventeenth Century, had for the most part their origin in this, that the State power was also the supreme Ecclesiastical power. It is likely that the Ecclesiastical relations of the Netherlands would have attained a better shape, if the Prince of Orange had lived longer. He had appointed a commission in 1581, which was to prepare a plan of organization on the basis of the conclusions of the Middleburg Synod. The plan was prepared, but before action could be taken on it the hand of an assassin (July 10, 1584) put an end to his life. The murderer, Balthazar Gérard, a fanatical Catholic, who approached the Prince under the pretext that he was an indigent Protestant, and received money from him, confessed that he was persuaded to the deed by a Franciscan and a Jesuit. All the Netherlands were plunged in deep sadness at his fall; for the "Father of the Fatherland" had been taken away. The contest, whose great leader had been William of Orange, was continued with untiring perseverance. Maurice of Orange, his son, took the place of his father; and when Spain, wholly exhausted, granted a twelve years' truce, in 1609, to the Netherlands, the freedom of the latter was looked upon as perfectly assured. The recognition of the Seventeen United Provinces as one free, independent State on the part of Spain followed in the Westphalia treaty of peace. Thenceforward the form of government, which the strength and wisdom of William of Orange had created, unfolded the characteristic peculiarities stamped upon it by him, both at home and abroad, with perfect freedom and safety. The Netherlands were the first State allowing freedom of conscience and toleration, in which a distinction was made between the citizen's civil obligations and his religious convictions. "Whoever was obliged to flee from other lands on account of his religion, Jews from Spain and Portugal-like Spinoza's parents, Socinians from Polandlike Samuel Crell, Huguenots and Jansenists from France, Presbyterians, Quakers, Episcopalians from England-all betook themselves to the protection of the Netherlands. The United States were the asylums where Cartesius, Spinoza, Becker, Bayle and Leclerc wrote. To them the English nation owes the preservation of Protestant freedom through William III and the Act of Toleration."* SUNDAY UNDER THE SHAWL.-A woman forgot to send home some work on Saturday. Sunday morning she told a little girl who lived with her to put on her things, and take the bundle under her shawl, to the lady's house. "Nobody will see it," she said. But is it not Sunday under my shawl, aunty?" asked the child. Yes, it is Sunday in the back yard as well as the front yard, Sunday down stairs as well as up stairs-in the kitchen and baby-house as well as in the parlor: and so the dear children must try and let all their behavior be in tune, and not out of tune, with the sweet quiet of the Lord's day. Lechler, Geschichte des Englischen Deismus, 152. ALTIPETA. An Italian Story-From the German. BY C. G. A. HULI HORST. Καὶ ἐδίδασκεν αὐτους Mareus. Divis orte bonis optime Romulæ Lucem redde tuæ, dux bone, patriæ, Thou, O glorious son of heaven, great Augustus, Restore thy light, O dearest chieftain, to this earth! Such were the aspiring words, sweetly flowing from the longing heart of a fair maiden, as she was sitting in a shady bower near the strand of the billowing sea. With the mellow tones of her voice mingled the tinkling of the classic lyre, without which she scarcely ever left her mansion, to wander over the small, but lovely island. She loved her lyre dearly; for it seemed to her to speak, stronger than the oracles, of a higher sphere of being, of a happier existence, of the world of spirits and an all-wise and good being, who had made all nature around her so beautiful. Yet this idea was only very faint in her mind— a dark and confused longing of her soul for something beyond the transitoriness of this earth. Her lot was cast in that period of the degeneracy of the Roman empire, when heathenism was struggling for life with a "new doctrine of the gods," originated by a poor man of Nazareth in Asia Minor. Altipeta, for this was the maiden's name, had indeed good reason to sing those melancholy, longing strains of Horace, where he implores "divine Augus tus" to return to the earth and restore light and peace. For all was confusion, and strife, and corruption around her; and she felt with sadness, that unless some deliverer should come to quicken the fading powers of her race, soon this otherwise lovely earth would have to become the scene of endless woe and destruction A short time ago a decree had been issued by the emperor Valerian, that no one in his dominion should be allowed to worship any other gods than those of the Romans. Scopulus, the father of Altipeta, held a number of slaves who had become converted to the new religion of the Nazarene, through the influence of one of their number, whose name was Foras. This Foras had formerly dwelt near Carthage, where he had come under the influence of Cyprian, a zealous disciple and teacher of the new religion. Scopulus was a fearful enemy of the Nazarenes, and he had to-day punished severely several of his slaves, who would not, in spite of his prohibition, cease to worship their higher Master, who, as they declared had died for them, but arose from the dead and was now in Paradise interceding for them with the Almighty Spirit. The cruel punishment of these slaves had touched the tender heart of Altipeta, and she had resolved to seek the open air, to give expression to her sadness in that woful utterance of Horace and the solemn warblings of her sweet lyre. She was not aware that this deliverer, for whom she sighed, had really appeared on earth, and that it was the same despised Nazarene, whose devout followers her sire's slaves had become. Yet a faint foreboding of this was germinating in her soul, which was soon to be nourished and bloom into a real and happy assurance. Scopulus was a civil magistrate under the cruel emperor Valerian, who persecuted the Christians with torture and bloodshed. He now received orders to come to the mainland, that he might aid in this hideous work. During the absence of her father, Altipeta wandered still more frequently through the leafy forests, enlivened by the rippling brook, and resounding with the melodious lays of light-winged songsters. Every evening, when the skillful pencils of the departing sun were tinting the fleecy cloudlets above the high-cliffed rocks with their heaven-born hues, when from the misty swamps echoed the monotonous chatterings of their inhabitants, when the weary slaves had retired from the lonely fields, then it was that Altipeta would silently seize her string-trembling lyre and wander in the lonely paths of the Isle Elysium. Although she could well appreciate the glorious splendor of rosy-cheeked Aurora, yet she loved most fondly to behold nature, as she softly lulled her children to rest under the downy covering of night. When she beheld the dazzling orb of the sun, as it declined more and more westward, when she gazed on the fire-tipped mountain-peaks in the distant West, this involuntarily caused her to reflect upon the unbounded wonders of this grand universe, until she was entirely lost in her fanciful dreams concerning the author of all this grandeur and beauty. It seemed to her as though the majestic motions in the heavens, notwithstanding their deep silence, were testifying most audibly of the wisdom and power of their author. "What causes that fiery disk, called sun, to rise and set so invariably? Whence has he those all-piercing darts of glowing light and heat? Why does his light, when poured against those curly cloudlets, shine in such various colors? Whence is that image, seen in that quiet mirror of the sea?" As she was thus engaged in deep, but very natural reflections, the full disk of the moon would appear in all her unpretending majesty. This would complete her awe and adoration. In such moments of solemn ecstasy, she would seat herself on some rocky, moss-cloaked prominence, and entice from her lyre charming notes of sweetly flowing melody. Oh! she then thought, how beautiful, how enchanting!-How happy would I be if only- she knew not what to add; for with all this beauty around her, she felt most alarmingly that there was still something wanting to complete her happiness; with all this plenty surrounding her, she felt an aching void in her being, but she knew not what this something was that was still lacking. When at this dazzling height of her spirit flight, her being was thrilled by a slight shudder, followed by a deep, significant sigh. She would then arise and slowly tread homeward, with a somewhat heavy heart; still, when she would cast another longing, expressive glance toward the star decked heavenly vault, and the melancholy countenance of the moon would beam with friendly sympathy upon her, a faint spark of hope would arise in her, and calm her troubled breast.-Would this spark be suffered to die, and her faint hope be abandoned to frustration? On one of these evenings, whilst she was taking her usual lonely walk along the pebbled sea-shore, and her thoughts were soaring in regions of fancy, her enchanted ear was suddenly struck by strains of sweetly flowing melody, re-echoing from the obscure distance over the gilded surface of the placid water. At first she fancied the graceful forms of nymphs gently ascending from the sea in the dubious twilight; but after a little cool reflection she could clearly distinguish the voices of human beings as they were borne to her ears on the wings of the balmy evening zephyr. The reflection from the water made it difficult to tell whence came the original sound; but after walking short distances in several directions, she ascertained the course she must take, to find the authors of these welcome notes. No fear of any kind entered her mind; for the beings, who could sing so lovely, must certainly be harmless and kind. Pressing her way through thick bushes that edged ivy decorated swamps, curving around mossy recesses and nooks, she suddenly beheld the sea spread out before her view; now she turned to the left, always instinetively following the direction whence proceeded the sounds, until she finally found herself at the entrance to a spacious cave; she entered and met here a number of her father's slaves, who began approaching her with serene voice and countenance, imploring her not to expose them to the wrath of her father, when he should return from the mainland. "We can not forsake our meetings here; the love of our divine Lord and Master constraineth us to worship and adore Him. We must meet here to strengthen one another in our holy Faith." With such words they accosted Altipeta, who stood before them, greatly astonished at the firmness and candor of these curious men. "You need fear no harm from me; for I love you all, and will not betray you to any one; only tell me more about your great Master whom you so ardently adore. What has He done for you, that He deserves such love?" "Our divine Master, Jesus Christ, has suffered and died in our stead, that we might again be brought into fellowship with the great God, who |