But the German and Spanish troops in Philip's pay were cantoned on the frontiers, ready to stifle any incipient effort in opposition to his plans.

In addition to these imposing means for their execution, he had secured a still more secret and more powerful support: a secret article in the treaty of Cateau-Cambresis obliged the king of France to assist him with the whole armies of France against his Belgian subjects, should they prove refractory.

Thus the late war, of which the Netherlands had borne all the weight, and earned all the glory, only brought about the junction of the defeated enemy with their own king for the extinction of their national independence.
To complete the execution of this system of perfidy, Philip convened an assembly of all the states at Ghent, in the month of July, 1559.

This meeting of the representatives of the three orders of the state offered no apparent obstacle to Philip's views.

The clergy, alarmed at the progress of the new doctrines, gathered more closely round the government of which they required the support.