him a character of unblemished integrity, prudence, toleration, and valor.  He was not of that impetuous stamp which leads men to heroic deeds, and brings danger to the states whose liberty is compromised by their ambition.  He was a striking contrast to his brother Maurice, and more resembled his father in many of those calmer qualities of the mind, which make men more beloved without lessening their claims to admiration.  Frederick Henry had the honor of completing the glorious task which William began and Maurice followed up.  He saw the oppression they had combated now humbled and overthrown; and he forms the third in a sequence of family renown, the most surprising and the least checkered afforded by the annals of Europe.

William II. succeeded his father in his dignities; and his ardent spirit longed to rival him in war.  He turned his endeavors to thwart all the efforts for peace.  But the interests of the nation and the dying wishes of Frederick Henry were of too powerful influence with the states, to be overcome by the martial yearnings of an inexperienced youth.  The negotiations were pressed forward; and, despite the complaints, the murmurs, and the intrigues of France, the treaty of Munster was finally signed by the respective ambassadors of the United Provinces and Spain, on the 30th of January, 1648.  This celebrated treaty contains seventy-nine articles.  Three points were of main and vital importance to the republic:  the first acknowledges an ample and entire recognition of the sovereignty of the states-general, and a renunciation forever of all claims on the part of Spain; the second confirms the rights of trade and navigation in the East and West Indies, with the possession of the various countries and stations then actually occupied by the contracting powers; the third guarantees a like possession of all the provinces and towns of the Netherlands, as they then stood in their respective occupation—­a clause highly favorable to the republic, which had conquered several considerable places in Brabant and Flanders.  The ratifications of the treaty were exchanged at Munster with great solemnity on the 15th of May following the signature; the peace was published in that town and in Osnaburg on the 19th, and in all the different states of the king of Spain and the United Provinces as soon as the joyous intelligence could reach such various and widely separated destinations.  Thus after eighty years of unparalleled warfare, only interrupted by the truce of 1609, during which hostilities had not ceased in the Indies, the new republic rose from the horrors of civil war and foreign tyranny to its uncontested rank as a free and independent state among the most powerful nations of Europe.  No country had ever done more for glory; and the result of its efforts was the irrevocable guarantee of civil and religious liberty, the great aim and end of civilization.

The king of France alone had reason to complain of this treaty:  his resentment was strongly pronounced.  But the United Provinces flung back the reproaches of his ambassador on Cardinal Mazarin; and the anger of the monarch was smothered by the policy of the minister.