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                           Foreign Statesmen

                          PHILIP II. OF SPAIN

                       [Illustration: colophon]




                          PHILIP II. OF SPAIN

                                  BY
                           MARTIN A. S. HUME

                               EDITOR OF
          THE ‘CALENDAR OF SPANISH STATE PAPERS OF ELIZABETH’
                        (PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE)

   _Philippus ipse Hispaniæ desiderio magnopere aestuabat, nec aliud
                      quam Hispaniam loquebatur._

                              SEPULVEDA.

                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
                      ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
                                 1911

                               COPYRIGHT

                         _First Edition 1897_
                     _Reprinted 1899, 1906, 1911_




                               CONTENTS


 CHAPTER I

 Philip’s failure, and the reasons for it--His birth and infancy--His
 appearance and character--His education by Siliceo and Zuñiga--The
 emperor meets his son--The consolidation of authority in
 Spain--Suggestions for marriage with Jeanne d’Albret--Philip made
 Regent of Spain--The emperor’s instructions to his son--His system
 of government--Character of his councillors--Philip’s marriage with
 Maria of Portugal--Birth of Don Carlos and death of the princess--Doña
 Isabel de Osorio--Philip in his domestic relations--Project for
 securing to Philip the imperial crown--The suzerainty of Spain over
 Italy--Philip’s voyage through Germany.....Page 1

 CHAPTER II

 The union of the Low Countries to Spain--The Italian suzerainty--The
 effects thereof--Etiquette of the House of Burgundy adopted in
 Spain--Ruy Gomez--Philip’s voyage--His unpopularity with Germans and
 Flemings--Fresh proposals for his marriage--The family compact for
 the imperial succession--Defection of Maurice of Saxony--War with
 France--Treaty of Passau--Defeat of the emperor at Metz.....20

 CHAPTER III

 Proposal to marry Philip to Queen Mary of England--The need for
 alliance with England--The negotiations of Renard--Opposition
 of France--Unpopularity of the match in England--Philip’s voyage
 to England--His affability--His first interview with Mary--The
 marriage--Philip made King of Naples--Failure of the objects of the
 marriage--Philip’s policy in England--Pole’s mission--Philip and the
 persecution of Catholics in England--Philip’s disappointment and
 departure.....30

 CHAPTER IV

 Philip in favour of a moderate policy in England--His attitude towards
 religion generally--He requests armed aid from England against the
 French--The emperor’s embarrassments in Italy--Alba made Philip’s
 viceroy in Italy--Factions in Philip’s court--Ruy Gomez and Alba--The
 emperor’s abdication--Philip’s changed position--His attitude towards
 the papacy--The Spanish Church--Pope Paul IV. and the Spaniards in
 Italy--Excommunication of Philip--Invasion of Rome by Alba--Philip’s
 second visit to England.....43

 CHAPTER V

 French intrigue against Mary--England at war with France--Battle
 of St. Quintin--Philip’s tardiness--The English contingent--The
 loss of Calais--Feria goes to England--His negotiations--Condition
 of England--The English fleet used by Philip--Philip and
 Elizabeth--Negotiations for peace--Death of Mary--Plans for
 Elizabeth’s marriage--Peace of Cateau Cambresis--Philip’s policy in
 England.....53

 CHAPTER VI

 Philip’s plan for a French alliance--His marriage with Elizabeth
 de Valois--Philip’s embarrassments in the Netherlands--De
 Granvelle--Philip’s departure from Flanders--Condition of
 affairs in Spain--The Spanish Church--Death of Paul IV.--The
 Inquisition--Bartolomé de Carranza--Philip’s arrival and routine in
 Spain--The auto de fé at Valladolid.....64

 CHAPTER VII

 Arrival of Elizabeth de Valois in Spain--Her influence over
 Philip--Position of affairs in France--War with England--Philip’s
 attitude towards France--Death of Francis II.--Spanish disaster at Los
 Gelves--Position of Spain in the Mediterranean Page 79

 CHAPTER VIII

 Don Carlos--His relations with Elizabeth de Valois--French intrigues
 for his marriage--His illness--The Cortes of Aragon--Jeanne d’Albret
 and Henry of Navarre--The Council of Trent and the Inquisition--Philip
 and the pope--Renewed struggles with the Turks--Siege of Malta.....88

 CHAPTER IX

 Troubles in the Netherlands--Granvelle’s unpopularity--William
 of Orange and Egmont--Their resignation and protest--Margaret of
 Parma--Assembly of the Chapter of the Golden Fleece--Riots at
 Valenciennes--Discontent of the Flemish nobles--They retire from
 government--Granvelle’s dismissal--The maladministration of the
 States--Egmont’s mission to Spain--Philip’s policy in the States--The
 Beggars--Orange’s action--Philip determines to exterminate heresy in
 the States--Philip’s projected voyage thither.....99

 CHAPTER X

 Renewed contest between Philip and the papacy--Condition of Don
 Carlos--His arrest and imprisonment--Philip’s explanations--Carlos’
 last illness and death--Death of Elizabeth de Valois--The interviews
 of Bayonne and the Catholic League--Catharine de Medici--Philip face
 to face with Protestantism--Philip and the Moriscos--Rising of the
 Moriscos--Deza at Granada--Don Juan of Austria--Expulsion of the
 Moriscos from Andalucia.....115

 CHAPTER XI

 Philip and England--Elizabeth seizes his treasure--Spanish plots
 against her--Philip and the northern rebellion--The excommunication
 of Elizabeth--Ridolfi’s plot--Philip’s hesitancy--Prohibition of
 English trade with Spain--Its futility--Alba’s retirement from
 Flanders--Philip’s responsibility for Alba’s proceedings--The tenth
 penny--Philip’s disapproval--Orange’s approaches to the French.....136

 CHAPTER XII

 Philip’s fourth marriage--The killing of Montigny--Anne of
 Austria--Philip’s domestic life--His industry--The Escorial--His
 patronage of art--His character--Renewed war with the Turks--Don Juan
 commands the Spanish force--The victory of Lepanto--Don Juan’s great
 projects--Antonio Perez.....153

 CHAPTER XIII

 The Spanish troops in Flanders--Don Juan sent to Flanders--His
 projects for invading England--Mutiny of the Spanish troops
 in Flanders--The Spanish fury--Evacuation of Flanders by the
 Spanish troops--Perez’s plot against Don Juan--The murder of
 Escobedo--Don Juan seizes Namur--Renewal of the war--The battle
 of Gemblours--Desperation of Don Juan--His death--Alexander
 Farnese.....168

 CHAPTER XIV

 Philip’s ineffectual action against Elizabeth--The Desmond
 rebellion--Philip’s conquest of Portugal--Recall of Alba and Granvelle
 to Philip’s councils--Don Antonio, Prior of O Crato--Death of Anne
 of Austria--Philip in Portugal--Flight of Antonio--His reception in
 England and France--The Duke of Alençon--Philip and Mary Stuart--James
 Stuart--Fresh proposals of the Scottish Catholics to Philip--Philip
 and Granvelle’s views with regard to England--Lennox and the Jesuits
 mismanage the plot--Philip’s claim to the English crown--Expulsion
 of Mendoza from England--The English exiles urge Philip to invade
 England--Sixtus V.--Intrigues in Rome--The Babington plot.....182

 CHAPTER XV

 The Infanta to be Queen of England--Approaches of the Scottish
 Catholic lords to Philip--Execution of Mary Stuart--Intrigues for
 the English succession--Drake’s expedition to Cadiz--The peace
 negotiations with Farnese--Preparations for the Armada--Sailing of
 the Armada from Lisbon--Its return to Vigo--Medina Sidonia advises
 its abandonment--Its strength--Engagements with the English--Panic at
 Calais--Final defeat--Causes of the disaster--Philip’s reception of
 the news.....202

 CHAPTER XVI

 Don Antonio in England--Catharine’s support of him--Strozzi’s
 defeat at St. Michaels--Philip’s patronage of assassination--Philip
 and the League--Renewal of the war of religion in France--The
 murder of Guise--Imprisonment of Antonio Perez and the Princess
 of Eboli--Perez’s treachery--His escape to Aragon--The _fueros_
 of Aragon--Philip proceeds against Perez--Perez arrested by the
 Inquisition of Aragon--Rising in Zaragoza--Perez’s escape--Suppression
 of the Aragonese.....223

 CHAPTER XVII

 Philip and Mayenne--The English attack upon Lisbon--Assassination
 of Henry III.--Philip’s plans in France--The war of the League--The
 battle of Ivry--Philip’s attitude towards Mayenne--Farnese enters
 France--Relief of Paris--Retirement of Farnese--Philip changes
 his plans in France--Farnese’s second campaign--Henry IV. goes to
 mass--Enters Paris as king--Exit of the Spaniards.....237

 CHAPTER XVIII

 Blighting influence of Philip’s system on his officers--Effects of
 Philip’s routine on the administration--Social condition of Spain and
 the colonies--Dr. Lopez and Antonio Perez--Philip II. and Tyrone’s
 rebellion--The English sacking of Cadiz--Philip’s resignation--His
 last illness and death--Results of his life--Causes of the decadence
 of the Spanish power.....249

 GENEALOGICAL TABLE SHOWING PHILIP’S CLAIM TO THE ENGLISH CROWN.....263

 APPENDIX.....265




CHAPTER I

     Philip’s failure, and the reasons for it--His birth and
     infancy--His appearance and character--His education by Siliceo and
     Zuñiga--The emperor meets his son--The consolidation of authority
     in Spain--Suggestions for marriage with Jeanne d’Albret--Philip
     made Regent of Spain--The emperor’s instructions to his son--His
     system of government--Character of his councillors--Philip’s
     marriage with Maria of Portugal--Birth of Don Carlos and death of
     the princess--Doña Isabel de Osorio--Philip in his domestic
     relations--Project for securing to Philip the imperial crown--The
     suzerainty of Spain over Italy--Philip’s voyage through Germany.


For three hundred years a bitter controversy has raged around the
actions of Philip II. of Spain. Until our own times no attempt even had
been made to write his life-history from an impartial point of view. He
had been alternately deified and execrated, until through the mists of
time and prejudice he loomed rather as the permanent embodiment of a
system than as an individual man swayed by changing circumstances and
controlled by human frailties.

The more recent histories of his reign--the works of English, American,
German, and French scholars--have treated their subject with fuller
knowledge and broader sympathies, but they have necessarily been to a
large extent histories of the great events which convulsed Europe for
fifty years at the most critical period of modern times. The space to be
occupied by the present work will not admit of this treatment of the
subject. The purpose is therefore to consider Philip mainly as a
statesman, in relation to the important problems with which he had to
deal, rather than to write a connected account of the occurrences of a
long reign. It will be necessary for us to try to penetrate the objects
he aimed at and the influences, personal and exterior, which ruled him,
and to seek the reasons for his failure. For he did fail utterly. In
spite of very considerable powers of mind, of a long lifetime of
incessant toil, of deep-laid plans, and vast ambitions, his record is
one continued series of defeats and disappointments; and in exchange for
the greatest heritage that Christendom had ever seen, with the
apparently assured prospect of universal domination which opened before
him at his birth, he closed his dying eyes upon dominions distracted and
ruined beyond all recovery, a bankrupt State, a dwindled prestige, and a
defeated cause. He had devoted his life to the task of establishing the
universal supremacy of Catholicism in the political interests of Spain,
and he was hopelessly beaten.

The reasons for his defeat will be seen in the course of the present
work to have been partly personal and partly circumstantial. The causes
of both these sets of reasons were laid at periods long anterior to
Philip’s birth.

The first of the great misfortunes of Spain was an event which at the
time looked full of bright promise, namely, the marriage of Juana,
daughter of Ferdinand and Isabel, to Philip of Austria, son of the
Emperor Maximilian. This marriage eventually burdened the King of Spain
with the German dominions of the House of Austria, the imperial crown,
with its suzerainty over Italy, the duchy of Milan, and, above all, the
rich inheritance of the House of Burgundy, the Franche Comté, Holland,
and the Netherlands. Even before this the crown of Aragon had been
weakened rather than strengthened by the possession of Sicily and
Naples, which latter brought it into inimical contact with France, and
also necessitated the assertion and defence of its rights as a
Mediterranean Power in constant rivalry with Turks and Algerians. This
had been bad, but the vast and scattered territories of Charles V.
cursed Spain with a foreign policy in every corner of Europe. In his
Austrian dominions the emperor was the outpost of Christianity against
the Turk, the bulwark which restrained the Moslem flood from swamping
eastern Europe. His galleys were those which were to keep the
Mediterranean a Christian sea. Flanders and the Franche Comté gave him a
long flat frontier conterminous with France, whose jealous eyes had been
fixed covetously for centuries on the fine harbours and flourishing
towns of the Low Countries.

Most of these interests were of very secondary importance to Spain
itself. The country had only quite recently been unified; the vast new
dominions which had fallen under its sway in America might well have
monopolised its activity for centuries to come. The geographical
position of the Iberian peninsula itself practically isolated it from
the other countries of Europe, and rendered it unnecessary for it to
take any part in the discords that prevailed over the rest of the
continent; whilst the recent religious struggles with the Moors in Spain
had consolidated Catholic Christianity in the country, and prevented the
reformed doctrines from obtaining any footing there. Spain indeed, alone
and aloof, with a fertile soil, fine harbours, and a well-disposed
population, seemed destined to enjoy a career of activity, prosperity,
and peace. But the possession of Flanders brought it into constant
rivalry with France, and necessitated a close alliance with England,
whilst the imperial connection dragged it into ceaseless wars with the
Turks, and, above all, with the rising power of Protestantism, which
ultimately proved its ruin. Philip, who succeeded to this thorny
inheritance, was, on the other hand, bounded and isolated by mental
limitations as irremovable as the Pyrenees which shut in his native
land. As King of Spain alone, having only local problems to deal with,
modest, cautious, painstaking, and just, he might have been a happy and
successful--even a great--monarch, but as leader of the conservative
forces of Christendom he was in a position for which his gifts unfitted
him.

He was the offspring of the marriage of first cousins, both his parents
being grandchildren of cunning, avaricious Ferdinand, and of Isabel the
Catholic, whose undoubted genius was accompanied by high-strung
religious exaltation, which would now be considered neurotic. Her
daughter, Juana the Mad, Philip’s grandmother, passed a long lifetime in
melancholy torpor. In Charles V. the tainted blood was mingled with the
gross appetites and heavy frames of the burly Hapsburgs. The strength
and power of resistance inherited from them enabled him, until middle
age only, to second his vast mental power with his indomitable bodily
energy. But no sooner was the elasticity of early manhood gone than he
too sank into despairing lethargy and religious mysticism. Philip’s
mother, the Empress Isabel, came from the same stock, and was the
offspring of several generations of consanguineous marriages. The curse
which afflicted Philip’s progenitors, and was transmitted with augmented
horror to his descendants, could not be expected to pass over Philip
himself; and the explanation of his attitude towards the political
events of his time must often be sought in the hereditary gloom which
fell upon him, and in the unshakable belief that he was in some sort a
junior partner with Providence, specially destined to link his mundane
fortunes with the higher interests of religion. His slow laboriousness,
his indomitable patience, his marble serenity, all seem to have been
imitated, perhaps unconsciously, from the relentless, resistless action
of divine forces.

On the other hand, his inherited characteristics were accentuated by his
education and training. From the time of his birth his father was
continually at war with infidels and heretics, and the earliest ideas
that can have been instilled into his infant mind were that he and his
were fighting the Almighty’s battles and destroying His enemies. In his
first years he was surrounded by the closest and narrowest devotees, for
ever beseeching the divine blessing on the arms of the absent emperor;
and when the time came for Philip to receive political instruction from
his father, at an age when most boys are frank and confiding, he was
ceaselessly told that his great destiny imposed upon him, above all, the
supreme duty of self-control, and of listening to all counsellors whilst
trusting none. No wonder, then, that Philip, lacking his father’s bodily
vigour, grew up secret, crafty, and over-cautious. No wonder that his
fervid faith in the divinity of his destiny and the sacredness of his
duty kept him uncompl