Don John was to be a dove of peace and an angel of love.
But even if a far abler man had been sent to heal the troubles in the Netherlands, the breach was now past mending.

In the States General, as in the nation at large, there were still two parties, one for Orange and one for Philip, but both were determined to get rid of the devilish incubus of the Spanish army.

The division of the two parties was to some extent sectional, but still more that class division that seems inevitable between conservatives and liberals.

The king still had for him the clergy, the majority of the nobles and higher bourgeoisie; with William were ranged the Calvinists, the middle and lower classes and most of the "intellectuals", lawyers, men of learning and those publicists known as the "monarchomachs." Many of {267} these were still Catholics who wished to distinguish sharply between the religious and the national issue.

At the very moment of Don John's arrival the Estates passed a resolution to uphold the Catholic faith.
[Sidenote: February, 1577] Even before he had entered his capital Don John issued the "Perpetual Edict" agreeing to withdraw the Spanish troops in return for a grant of 600,000 guilders for their pay.