256 Chapter XI
wanted no more to happen. The republic drifted. It went to war with France in
1793, with something less than enthusiasm on the part of its people.^25 Secretly, in
every town, there were men who had been Patriots, who had drilled in the Free
Corps and stood by to let the Prussian regiments pass in 1787, men now in com-
munication with émigrés beyond the frontier, and who believed, from their own
bitter experience, that there could be no democratic revolution in the Dutch prov-
inces except in alliance with the French army.
The Orange regime was guaranteed in 1788 by Great Britain and Prussia. “The
once so mighty Republic of the United Netherlands had, thanks to the Orange
victory, put itself under foreign care.”^26 The Dutch Republic first lost its indepen-
dence, not to the “Jacobins” in 1795, but to the already well developed forces of the
European counterrevolution in 1787.
The Belgian Revolution
“Governed by their own laws, secure in their property and their personal liberty,
paying only moderate taxes which they lay upon themselves, the Belgians enjoy the
finest gifts of a free constitution.”^27 So it seemed to an English traveller in the
Austrian Netherlands. Nor was he mistaken, though there was much in the laws,
the property, and the liberty that came in time to provoke discontent. Satisfaction
with their constitution was as characteristic of the Belgian provinces as of En-
gland. Not even English Whigs or American colonials dwelt so fervidly upon
rights and liberties set forth in documents of long ago. Each province had a kind
of historic charter. That of Brabant, the most important, was called the Joyous
Entry, from the guarantees issued by the Duke of Brabant in 1355. The tax burden
was also gratifyingly low, perhaps a tenth of that of neighboring Holland and En-
gland. It may even have been the lowest in the world of European civilization, ex-
cept for the disorganized Poles and the fortunate Americans.^28 In short, although
25 In February 1793, says Geyl, “stand bij ons Willem V met zijn aanhang van oligarchen en
predikanten los van die natie”—William V stood apart from the nation with his following of oligarchs
and preachers. It is doubtful that Geyl would accept Cobban’s conclusion that Sir James Harris, by
putting back the Orange party, made possible the Orange restoration in 1814. After all, even the
Bourbons were restored then, in Spain and Naples as in France. The strength of the modern House of
Orange derives from the very different policies of William V’s son.
26 Vijlbrief, 168.
27 T. Juste, Histoire des Etats- generaux des Pays Bas, 1465–1790, 2 vols. (Brussels, 1864), II, 122.
For the most part, however, the present section depends on the admirable study by Suzanne Tassier,
Les démocrates belges de 1789: étude sur le Vonckisme et la Révolution brabançonne (Brussels, 1930), in
Mémoires de l ’Académie royale de Belgique, Classe des lettres, 2nd series, vol. X XVIII: and on P. von Mi-
trofanov, Joseph II: seine politische und Kulturelle Tätigkeit, aus dem russischen ins deutsch übersetzt (Vi-
enna, 1910), where events in Belgium are seen in comparison with those in other parts of the Haps-
burg empire. See also J. Gilissen, Le régime représentatif avant 1790 en Belgique (Brussels, 1952). For
local case histories see for example V. Fris, Histoire de Gand (Ghent, 1930) (favorable to Joseph II and
to Vonck), and J. Lefevre, “Le gouvernement du comté de Hainaut au XVIII siècle,” in Anciens pays et
assemblés d ’ états, V (Louvain, 1953), 23–47 (more favorable to the old order). The literature is very
large.
28 See estimates in the Table in Chapter VI above.