All obstacles having been thus removed, the memorable treaty called the Perpetual Edict was signed at Marche en Famine on the 12th, and at Brussels on the 17th of February, 1577.  This document, issued in the name of the King, contained nineteen articles.  It approved and ratified the Peace of Ghent, in consideration that the prelates and clergy, with the doctors ‘utriusque juris’ of Louvain, had decided that nothing in that treaty conflicted either with the supremacy of the Catholic Church or the authority of the King, but, on the contrary, that it advanced the interests of both.  It promised that the soldiery should depart “freely, frankly, and without delay; by land, never to return except in case of foreign war”—­the Spaniards to set forth within forty days, the Germans and others so soon as arrangements had been made by the states-general for their payment.  It settled that all prisoners, on both sides, should be released, excepting the Count Van Buren, who was to be set free so soon as the states-general having been convoked, the Prince of Orange should have fulfilled the resolutions to be passed by that assembly.  It promised the maintenance of all the privileges, charters, and constitutions of the Netherlands.  It required of the states all oath to maintain the Catholic religion.  It recorded their agreement to disband their troops.  It settled that Don John should be received as Governor-General, immediately upon the departure of the Spaniards, Italians, and Burgundians from the provinces.

These were the main provisions of this famous treaty, which was confirmed a few weeks afterwards by Philip, in a letter addressed to the states of Brabant, and by an edict issued at Madrid.  It will be seen that everything required by the envoys of the states, at the commencement of their negotiations, had been conceded by Don John.  They had claimed the departure of the troops, either by land or sea.  He had resisted the demand a long time, but had at last consented to despatch them by sea.  Their departure by land had then been insisted upon.  This again he had most reluctantly conceded.  The ratification of the Ghent treaty, he had peremptorily refused.  He had come to the provinces, at the instant of its conclusion, and had, of course, no instructions on the subject.  Nevertheless, slowly receding, he had agreed, under certain reservations, to accept the treaty.  Those reservations relating to the great points of Catholic and royal supremacy, he insisted upon subjecting to his own judgment alone.  Again he was overruled.  Most unwillingly he agreed to accept, instead of his own conscientious conviction, the dogmas of the State Council and of the Louvain doctors.  Not seeing very clearly how a treaty which abolished the edicts of Charles the Fifth and the ordinances of Alva—­which removed the religious question in Holland and Zealand from the King’s jurisdiction to that of the states-general—­which had caused persecution to surcease—­had established toleration—­and which moreover, had confirmed the arch rebel and heretic of all the Netherlands in the government of the two rebellious and heretic provinces, as stadholder for the King—­not seeing very clearly how such a treaty was “advantageous rather than prejudicial to royal absolutism and an exclusive Catholicism,” he naturally hesitated at first.