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"The royal will," he said, "is too clearly and too precisely stated; it is the result of too long and too mature deliberation for us to venture to delay its execution without bringing on ourselves the reproach of the most culpable obstinacy." "That I take on myself," interrupted Viglius; "I oppose myself to, his displeasure.
With tears streaming down her cheeks, Margaret turned to the aged President, uttering fierce reproaches and desponding lamentations. Viglius brought the news that the citizens had taken possession of the gates, and were resolved not to permit her departure from the city.
Barbara saw the bishop shake his head in dissent and, while she was listening with strained ears to his explanation, Viglius, as if singing bass to Granvelle's tenor, repeated again and again at brief intervals, in a low tone, the one word, "Debts," while his green eyes sparkled, sometimes as if asking assent, sometimes combatively.
Philip lay sick at Segovia when the news of the outbreak of the Iconoclasts and the uncatholic agreement entered into with the Reformers reached him. At the same time the regent renewed her urgent entreaty for his personal visit, of which also all the letters treated, which the President Viglius exchanged with his friend Hopper.
The whole council nearly was on the side of Orange; a decided majority were for entreating the king either to recall the decrees entirely or at least to publish them under certain limitations. This proposition was resisted by Viglius, who insisted on a strict and literal obedience to the royal commands.
Even the few who, like State Counsellor Viglius, still firmly adhered to her, did so less from attachment to her person than from vexation at being displaced by novices and foreigners, and from being too proud to serve a fresh apprenticeship under a new viceroy.
So shall your conscience become a shield of iron; so shall the happiness of a whole country witness before the angels, of your truth to his Majesty, in the cause of his true grandeur and glory." These stirring appeals to an order of which Philip was chief, Viglius chancellor, Egmont, Mansfeld, Aerschot, Berlaymont, and others, chevaliers, were not likely to produce much effect.
Next to him among the royalist party was Viglius, president of the privy council, an erudite schoolman, attached less to the broad principles of justice than to the letter of the laws, and thus carrying pedantry into the very councils of the state.
Placed in the midst of a nation which hated him, exposed to the furious opposition of the most powerful adversaries, having hardly a friend, except the cowardly Viglius and the pluralist Morillon, secretly betrayed by Margaret of Parma, insulted by rude grandees, and threatened by midnight assassins, he never lost his self-possession, his smooth arrogance, his fortitude.
The council determined to revise the instructions on the lines suggested by Orange, whose words had such an effect upon the aged Viglius, that he had that very night a stroke of apoplexy, which proved fatal. Egmont set out for Spain, January 15, 1565, and on his arrival was received by Philip with extreme courtesy and graciousness.
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