William the Silent quotes

William the Silent was a Dutch nobleman and the main leader of the Dutch revolt against Spanish rule, which led to the independence of the Netherlands. Often called the "Father of the Fatherland," he played a crucial role in shaping the Dutch nation. He is remembered for his leadership, his advocacy for religious tolerance, and his enduring legacy in Dutch history. Here are 35 of his quotes:

I am resolved, to go and plant myself in Holland or in Zeeland, and there await the issue which it shall please Him to ordain.

William the Silent

In all things there must be order, but it must of such a kind as is possible to observe ... to see a man burnt for doing as he thought right, harms the people, for this is a matter of conscience.

William the Silent

My legal wife is to me dead; the only ecclesiastical authority I recognise pronounces me free; the attacks and threats of men do not disturb me. I am acting according to a clear conscience, and am doing hurt to no man. For my conduct, I will answer to my maker.

William the Silent

We may see how miraculously God defends our people, and makes us hope that, in spite of the malice of our enemies, He will bring our cause to a good and happy end, to the advancement of His glory and the deliverance of so many Christians from unjust oppression.

William the Silent

I cannot approve of monarchs who want to rule over the conscience of the people, and take away their freedom of choice and religion.

William the Silent

Do not kill him! I forgive him my death.

William the Silent

You are staking your own head by trusting the King. Never will I so stake mine, for he has deceived me too often. His favourite maxim is, haereticis non est servanda fides. I am now bald and Calvinist and in that faith will I die.

William the Silent

If they be dead, as I can no longer doubt, we must submit to the will of God and trust in His divine Providence, that He who has given the blood of His only Son to maintain His Church will do nothing but what will redound to the advancement of His glory and the preservation of His Church-however impossible it may appear. And though we all were to die, and all this poor people were massacred and driven out, we still must trust that God will not abandon his own.

William the Silent

They stormed Oudewater, and delivered it over to all imaginable cruelties, sparing neither sex nor age.

William the Silent

I am no Calvinist, but it seems to me neither right nor worthy of a Christian to seek, for the sake of differences between the doctrine of Calvin and the Confession of Augsburg, to have this land swarming with troops and inundated with blood.

William the Silent

God save the King!

William the Silent

Then Kill me at once!

William the Silent

One need not hope in order to undertake, nor succeed in order to persevere.

William the Silent

I have come to make my grave in this land.

William the Silent

Our friends and allies are all turned cold.

William the Silent

It is the will of God, and we must submit; but I call my God to witness that I have done all that in me lay to save the city, utterly desperate as I knew the attempt to be. When I took in hand the defence of these oppressed Christians, I made an alliance with the mightiest of all Potentates-the God of Hosts, who is able to save us, if He choose.

William the Silent

I will say no more, than that I will act as I shall answer hereafter to God and to man.

William the Silent

Now, we shall see the beginning of a great tragedy.

William the Silent

This mercy will be your ruin; you will be at the bridge across which the Spaniards will enter this land.

William the Silent

Sire, have pity on the Spanish infantry, which, for lack of pay and out of sheer starvation, is scouring the low country round, plundering the peasantry in mere need of food. These disorders I cannot repress, much less can I punish them, for necessity has no law.

William the Silent

Would not the German princes at least intercede with Philip? Would they hinder the passage of the royal mercenaries from Germany? Saxony, Hesse, Wurtemburg, and the rest offer excellent advice, to beware of Philip, not to drive him to extremity, to avoid outrages.

William the Silent

All in the world I have is yours; Next to God, you are the one I love best, and if I did not know that your love for me is the same, I could not be so happy as I am: May God give us both the grace to live always in this affection without any guile.

William the Silent