Note 132 — Chapter XX · LOUIS XIV, SPAIN, AND HOLLAND

[In 1650 a violent attempt of the young William II of Nassau against the states-general had failed and the stadholder died a few months after, leaving an unborn son who was to become the famous William III. The stadholdership had been abolished and the grand pensionary of the province of Holland became the first personage of the United Provinces, like the president of the states-general. Jan de Witt had been filling these high functions since 1653. Elected at the age of twenty-five, he showed at once the ripeness of a great statesman and the devotion of a great citizen. With a mind at once practical and philosophic, loving letters and the arts as much as affairs, a wise administrator and skilful diplomat, he was not unlike the last great men of Greece; and a contemporary—a very competent judge, the count d’Estrades—has compared his mind to that of Richelieu.c]