I recommend you earnestly however to have a care for the security of your person, for that is of more consequence than all the rest." After the news of the reduction of the city, he again expressed gratification, but in rather cold language.

"From such obstinate people," said he, "not more could be extracted than has been extracted; therefore the capitulation is satisfactory." What more he wished to extract it would be difficult to say, for certainly the marrow had been extracted from the bones, and the dead city was thenceforth left to moulder under the blight of a foreign garrison and an army of Jesuits.

"Perhaps religious affairs will improve before long," said Philip.

They did improve very soon, as he understood the meaning of improvement.

A solitude of religion soon brought with it a solitude in every other regard, and Antwerp became a desert, as Sainte Aldegonde had foretold would be the case.
The King had been by no means so calm, however, when the intelligence of the capitulation first reached him at Madrid.