CHAP.

VII.

HISTORY OP ENGLAND.

great political parties. The chiefs of the municipal oligarchywere Arminians, and were commonly regarded by the multi-tude as little better than Papists. The princes of Orange hadgenerally been the patrons of the Calvinistic divinity, and owedno small part of their popularity to their zeal for the doctrinesof election and final perseverance, a zeal not always en-lightened by knowledge or tempered by humanity. "Williamhad been carefully instructed from a child in the theologicalsystem to which his family was attached, and regarded thatsystem with even more than the partiality which men generallyfeel for a hereditary faith. He had ruminated on the greatenigmas which had been discussed in the Synod of Dort, andhad found in the austere and inflexible logic of the Geneveseschool something which suited his intellect and his temper.That example of intolerance indeed which some of his prede-cessors had set he never imitated. For all persecution he felta fixed aversion, which he avowed, not only where the avowalwas obviously politic, but on occasions where it seemed thathis interest would have been promoted by dissimulation or bysilence. His theological opinions, however, were even moredecided than those of his ancestors. The tenet of predestina-tion was the keystone of his religion. He often declared that,if he were to abandon that tenet, he must abandon with it allbelief in a superintending Providence, and must become amere Epicurean. Except in this single instance, all the sap ofhis vigorous mind was early drawn away from the speculativeto the practical. The faculties which are necessary for theconduct of important business ripened in him at a time of lifewhen they have scarcely begun to blossom in ordinary men.Since Octavius the world had seen no such instance of preco-cious statesmanship. Skilful diplomatists were surprised tohear the weighty observations which at seventeen the Princemade on public affairs, and still more surprised to see a lad,in situations in which he might have been expected to betraystrong passion, preserve a composure as imperturbable astheir own. At eighteen he sate among the fathers of the com-monwealth, grave, discreet, and judicious as the oldest amongthem. At twenty-one, in a day of gloom and terror, he was