She wrote despairing letters to Philip, describing the condition of the land and her own agony in the gloomiest colors.

Since the arrival of the royal orders, she said, things had gone from bad to worse.

The King had been ill advised.

It was useless to tell the people that the inquisition had always existed in the provinces.

They maintained that it was a novelty; that the institution was a more rigorous one than the Spanish Inquisition, which, said Margaret, "was most odious, as the King knew." It was utterly impossible to carry the edicts into execution.
Nearly all the governors of provinces had told her plainly that they would not help to burn fifty or sixty thousand Netherlanders.