The remaining forms of the government were hardly altered; so that the state was wholly regulated by its ancient usages; and, like some Gothic edifice, its beauty and solidity were perfectly original, and different from the general rules and modern theories of surrounding nations.  The country loved its liberty such as it found it, and not in the fashion of any Utopian plan traced by some new-fangled system of political philosophy.  Inherently Protestant and commercial, the Dutch abhorred every yoke but that of their own laws, of which they were proud even in their abuse.  They held in particular detestation all French customs, in remembrance of the wretchedness they had suffered from French tyranny; they had unbounded confidence in the House of Orange, from long experience of its hereditary virtues.  The main strength of Holland was, in fact, in its recollections; but these, perhaps, generated a germ of discontent, in leading it to expect a revival of all the influence it had lost, and was little likely to recover, in the total change of systems and the variations of trade.  There nevertheless remained sufficient capital in the country, and the people were sufficiently enlightened, to give just and extensive hope for the future which now dawned on them.  The obstacles offered by the Dutch character to the proposed union were chiefly to be found in the dogmatical opinions, consequent on the isolation of the country from all the principles that actuated other states, and particularly that with which it was now joined:  while long-cherished sentiments of opposition to the Catholic religion was little likely to lead to feelings of accommodation and sympathy with its new fellow-citizens.

The inhabitants of Belgium, accustomed to foreign domination, were little shocked by the fact of the allied powers having disposed of their fate with consulting their wishes.  But they were not so indifferent to the double discovery of finding themselves the subjects of a Dutch and a protestant king.  Without entering at large into any invidious discussion on the causes of the natural jealousy which they felt toward Holland, it may suffice to state that such did exist, and in no very moderate degree.  The countries had hitherto had but little community of interests with each other; and they formed elements so utterly discordant as to afford but slight hope that they would speedily coalesce.  The lower classes of the Belgian population were ignorant as well as superstitious (not that these two qualities are to be considered as inseparable); and if they were averse to the Dutch, they were perhaps not more favorably disposed to the French and Austrians.  The majority of the nobles may be said to have leaned more, at this period, to the latter than to either of the other two peoples.  But the great majority of the industrious and better informed portions of the middle orders felt differently from the other two, because they had found tangible and positive advantages in their subjection to France, which overpowered every sentiment of political degradation.