Prince had been bitterly deceived by Anjou and by the French court.  They besought him to rely upon the assistance of the Almighty, and upon the exertions of the nation, and they again hinted at the propriety of his accepting that supreme sovereignty over all the united provinces which would be so gladly conferred, while, for their own parts, they voluntarily offered largely to increase the sums annually contributed to the common defence.

Very soon afterwards, in August, 1583, the states of the united provinces assembled at Middelburg formally offered the general government—­which under the circumstances was the general sovereignty—­to the Prince, warmly urging his acceptance of the dignity.  He manifested, however, the same reluctance which he had always expressed, demanding that the project should beforehand be laid before the councils of all the large cities, and before the estates of certain provinces which had not been represented at the Middelburg diet.  He also made use of the occasion to urge the necessity of providing more generously for the army expenses and other general disbursements.  As to ambitious views, he was a stranger to them, and his language at this moment was as patriotic and self-denying as at any previous period.  He expressed his thanks to the estates for this renewed proof of their confidence in his character, and this additional approbation of his course,—­a sentiment which he was always ready “as a good patriot to justify by his most faithful service.”  He reminded them, however, that he was no great monarch, having in his own hands the means to help and the power to liberate them; and that even were he in possession of all which God had once given him, he should be far from strong enough to resist, single-handed, their powerful enemy.  All that was left to him, he said, was an “honest and moderate experience in affairs.”  With this he was ever ready to serve them to the utmost; but they knew very well that the means to make that experience available were to be drawn from the country itself.  With modest simplicity, he observed that he had been at work fifteen or sixteen years, doing his best, with the grace of God, to secure the freedom of the fatherland and to resist tyranny of conscience; that he alone—­assisted by his brothers and some friends and relatives—­had borne the whole burthen in the beginning, and that he had afterwards been helped by the states of Holland and Zealand, so that he could not but render thanks to God for His great mercy in thus granting His blessing to so humble an instrument, and thus restoring so many beautiful provinces to their ancient freedom and to the true religion.  The Prince protested that this result was already a sufficient reward for his labors—­a great consolation in his sufferings.  He had hoped, he said, that the estates, “taking into consideration his long-continued labors, would have been willing to excuse him from a new load of cares, and would have granted him some little rest in his already advanced age;” that they would have selected “some other person more fitted for the labor, whom he would himself faithfully promise to assist to the best of his abilities, rendering him willing obedience proportionate to the authority conferred upon him.”