They had been made use of, he said, to authorize the very error against which they had been directed.

They had been held to intend the very contrary of what they did mean.

He felt himself bound in conscience therefore, finding these differences ready to be "hatched into schisms," to warn the States once more against pests so pernicious.
Although the royal language was somewhat vague so far as enunciation of doctrine, a point on which he had once confessed himself fallible, was concerned, there was nothing vague in his recommendation of a National Synod.

To this the opposition of Barneveld was determined not upon religious but upon constitutional grounds.

The confederacy did not constitute a nation, and therefore there could not be a national synod nor a national religion.
Carleton came before the States-General soon afterwards with a prepared oration, wearisome as a fast-day sermon after the third turn of the hour-glass, pragmatical as a schoolmaster's harangue to fractious little boys.
He divided his lecture into two heads--the peace of the Church, and the peace of the Provinces--starting with the first.