If protocols, replications, annotations, apostilles, could heal a bleeding country, here were the physicians to furnish those drugs in unlimited profusion.
If reams of paper, scrawled over with barbarous technicalities, could smother and bury a quarrel which had its origin in the mutual antagonism of human elements, here were the men to scribble unflinchingly, till the reams were piled to a pyramid.

If the same idea presented in many aspects could acquire additional life, here were the word-mongers who, could clothe one shivering thought in a hundred thousand garments, till it attained all the majesty which decoration could impart.

In truth, the envoys came from Spain, Rome, and Vienna, provided with but two ideas.
Was it not a diplomatic masterpiece, that from this frugal store they could contrive to eke out seven mortal months of negotiation?
Two ideas--the supremacy of his Majesty's prerogative, the exclusive exercise of the Roman Catholic religion--these were the be-all and the end-all of their commission.

Upon these two strings they were to harp, at least till the walls of Maestricht had fallen.

The envoys did their duty well; they were sent to enact a solemn comedy, and in the most stately manner did they walk through their several parts.