The five other provinces were decidedly Contra-Remonstrant.
It is obvious therefore that the influence of Barneveld, hitherto so all-controlling in the States-General, and which rested on the complete submission of the States of Holland to his will, was tottering.

The battle-line between Church and State was now drawn up; and it was at the same time a battle between the union and the principles of state sovereignty.
It had long since been declared through the mouth of the Advocate, but in a solemn state manifesto, that My Lords the States-General were the foster-fathers and the natural protectors of the Church, to whom supreme authority in church matters belonged.
The Contra-Remonstrants, on the other hand, maintained that all the various churches made up one indivisible church, seated above the States, whether Provincial or General, and governed by the Holy Ghost acting directly upon the congregations.
As the schism grew deeper and the States-General receded from the position which they had taken up under the lead of the Advocate, the scene was changed.

A majority of the Provinces being Contra-Remonstrant, and therefore in favour of a National Synod, the States-General as a body were of necessity for the Synod.
It was felt by the clergy that, if many churches existed, they would all remain subject to the civil authority.

The power of the priesthood would thus sink before that of the burgher aristocracy.

There must be one church--the Church of Geneva and Heidelberg--if that theocracy which the Gomarites meant to establish was not to vanish as a dream.