588 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1815. 
Second, who will be ranked in 
the class of philosophic princes, 
was studious to introduce what he 
‘ deemed free and liberal principles 
among his Belgian subjects. But 
the clergy saw in toleration the 
destruction of religion, and in- 
liberal principles the subversion 
of the privileges of the church. 
They resisted, with force of arms, 
those dangeroustenets, and framed 
for themselves a government ex- 
empt from sucli political heresies. 
A clergy who had thus put them- 
selves into rebellion, for their 
good old cause, against a Catholic 
prince might well hesitate in ac- 
cepting the present of liberty 
which was now offered them by 
their new Protestant sovereign, 
the King of Holland. Like the 
cautious High Priest of Troy, 
who proclaimed his “ fear of the 
Greeks, and those who were the 
bearers: of gifts;” so they con- 
sider it asa duty to put them- 
selves on their guard against this 
Protestant protection of the Ca- 
tholic Church, and narrowly in- 
spect whether mischief might not 
lurk beneath a Constitution, which 
was at least suspicioussince it bore 
the name of liberal. 
This was a knotty affair; it 
was an easier enterprize for the 
allies to overthrow the tyrant of 
the world, and deliver Europe 
from its bondage, than for a Pro- 
testant Prince to render himself 
popular to a Belgian Catholic 
clergy. 0? at 
The English government was 
highly interested in supporting 
the authority of his new Belgian 
Majesty. It was, in fact, a kind 
of commonconcern. The churches 
of those provinces had been stript 
of their principal ornaments, and 
it was believed that the restoration 
of the pictures from their bond- 
age in the Museum of Paris, 
would be an homage rendered to’ 
the faithful and the church, and 
would, perhaps, soften the op- 
position of its ministers to the ac- 
ceptance of liberty. 
The public in England seemed 
at that time to have corresponding 
sentiments with the government, 
and to approve the removal of the 
paintings in sympathy with the 
Belgic churches. ‘These two 
causes led the English minister 
at Paris to give in.a note in their 
favour to the congress of the four 
powers who now govern the 
world, and who were here assem- 
bled. The arrivalof M. Canova 
at Paris, at this period, led the 
English minister to take the same 
interest for his Holiness the Pope. 
He represented that the peace of 
Tolentino could not be the found- 
dation of any right, since the 
French, after taking the objects 
in question, had themselves broken 
the treaty, and that it was there- 
fore just that the more powerful 
sovereigns should support. the 
cause of the weaker, which was 
evidently the case with the Pope. 
Lord Castlereagh furthermore 
represented the advantages which 
the arts would obtain by being 
cultivated at Rome, and that this 
idea had been so strongly im- 
pressed on the French artists 
themselves, that MM. Quatremer 
de Quincy, Denon, David, Gi- 
raudet, and forty other artists, _ 
had signed a petition, before 
their removal to the directory, 
not to displace those objects. 
Those to whom the English mi- 
nister’s observations were known, 
seemed to consider them as made- 
