#netherlnds

England assisted Holland in the latter’s struggle against Spain, under the pretext of serving the cause of Protestant freedom. During the war of destruction subsequently waged by her against Protestant Holland, England relied for help on Catholic France. While England had, in the sixteenth century, given herself out as the “champion of political freedom,” and had in this capacity come to the help of the Netherlands, she allied herself, in the seventeenth century, just as enthusiastically with the absolutist French monarchy, in order to destroy republican Holland.   [22]