GroenvanPrinsterer HisLifeandWork

Groen van Prinsterer: His Life and Work
Table of Contents
Preface vii
1. Formative years 1
2. In the nursery of history 30
3. Battling the spirit of the age 48
4. About a revolution 70
5. In the political arena 86
6. Isolation and independence 107
7. Fighting to the end 125
8. Evaluation 134
For further reading 149
v
Preface
The text of this translation is based on my book of 1976 entitled Mr.

G. Groen van Prinsterer (Goes: Oosterbaan & Le Cointre), with small
additions from the revised edition of 1977. Some new materials have
been added from my later writings.
This little book does not claim to be offering any new facts or new
interpretations. It is certainly not the comprehensive scholarly biogra-
phy that Groen van Prinsterer deserves in view of the important place
he occupies in Dutch history.
In 1895, one biographer noted that it was surprising how little
people knew, even in Christian circles, about the life and work of Groen
van Prinsterer. That observation still seems true today, a century and a
quarter after Groen's death.
It is my hope that this little book—which can be no more than a
popular introduction to a serious study of Groen—will whet the
reader's appetite for a broader and deeper acquaintance with the person
and work of the eminent Dutch Christian historian and statesman
Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer.
Gerrit J. Schulte
Free University
Amsterdam
VII
Chapter 1
Formative Years
ThePrinsterer,
subject of our biographical sketch, Guillaume Groen van
has a rather interesting family-tree. His father,
Pieter Jacobus Groen van Prinsterer, was a medical doctor, but
his grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather had
been respectable, if not very prominent, village pastors of the
Dutch Reformed Church. When Pieter Jacobus went to university,
however, he chose medicine instead of theology. Upon graduation
he set up a practice in The Hague and became a skilful doctor who
attracted many patients, also from well-to-do families In 1797 he
married the 23-year-old orphan Adriana Hendrika Caan. It was a
happy union, also socially, because Adriana Hendrika was heir to
the fortunes of a Rotterdam merchant family which in the 18t h
century had come to belong to the Regents, the governing burgher
class. Her mother was a sister of the well-known Patriot bankers
from Amsterdam, the Van Staphorsts. No wonder jealous tongues
commented enviously that the smartest thing the doctor with the
long nose had done in his life was to marry one of Holland's
richest heiresses.
Groen's parents
That comment was not quite fair. Dr. Groen van Prinsterer was the
kind of man to whom a wife can entrust herself with the fullest
confidence. He was a caring husband and would be a loving father.
His career was well on track: he was court physician in turn to
Grand Pensionary Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck, to King Louis
2 Groen van Prinsterer
Napoleon, and after 1813 to King William I. Dr. Groen—the

double surname is usually shortened to the first part—served on all
kinds of state medical committees, held a seat for thirty years in
the Provincial States or legislature of Holland, and received the
highest recognition for his life of service to the nation when he was
appointed to the Council of State. He was an active and capable
man with fresh, modern ideas who propagated smallpox inocu-
lation and sea-bathing. As an opponent of the age-old custom of
burial inside the church he was the initiator of the founding of a
new burial plot on the outskirts of The Hague, which was given
the fitting name Ter Navolging ("To Be Followed"), in the hope
that his example would be followed by more cemeteries in the rest
of the country.
Many years later, in his son's Handbook of Dutch History, Dr.
Groen's generation was aptly characterized as follows: they were
people who did not want to miss out on the progress of the age.
They felt that remaining true to the gospel in church and at home
could easily be reconciled with the independent pursuit of science.
Averse to "enthusiasts" and other "religious extremists," they
believed that a Christianity rightly understood would not be at
variance with the light of Reason. Rather, a serious effort to
reconcile religion and philosophy would be the key to a bright
future. The modern project of renewal was resulting in amazing
material advancements. All kinds of social improvements were
being realized as well, and the seeds of civil and political liberty
were being sown everywhere.
Some of the champions of renewal were radicals, as in 1795,
when they replaced the old Dutch Republic by the Batavian
Republic. They were like the revolutionary Jacobins in France who
knocked down the old institutions with a battering-ram. But revo-
lutionary overthrow turned out to be easier than the laborious task
of reconstruction. Political instability was the result, punctuated by
many coups. Moreover, the Dutch had surrendered themselves to
Formative Years 3
their French "brothers" and so they were lowered to the status of

a French satellite. Later generations feel embarrassed at the years
1795-1813, which is known in Dutch history as "The French
Period." Others poke fun at it. Both groups have reasons enough,
yet one must not forget that the French Period was also a very con-
structive time in which the revolutionary storms removed much
dead wood and made room for new life forms. The steady labours
of those who were preparing a new justice system, working at a
new economic and social order, and pursuing what can be called
scientific and technological progress, were extremely significant
even if less conspicuous than all those political experiments.
Dr. Groen belonged to that quiet but determined group of
people who were preparing the country for the inevitable process
of modernization. The lifelong desire of this practical and prosaic
man was to contribute to the creation of more rational and more
decent society. He probably picked up this idea in his parental
home: his father, Rev. Cornelis Groen van Prinsterer (1731-97),
belonged to the moderate wing of the Patriot party which during
the 1780's had agitated for enlightened democratic reforms.
Through his marriage the son of Cornelis came into closer contact
with Patriot circles. Dr. Groen did not indulge in party politics,
however; he stuck to medicine. But his cordial relations with
Schimmelpenninck, his appointments under successive regimes in
the cause of modernizing medical care (he became what was in
effect the first inspector of public health in the Netherlands), all
this shows that Dr. Groen figured among those people who were
striving for the renewal of society without too many political
preconceptions.
Doctor and Madame Groen were blessed with three children.
The eldest daughter, Cornelia Adriana (usually called Keetje) was
born in 1799. In 1821 she married Mari Hoffman, a well-to-do
merchant from Rotterdam who for 25 years was to hold a seat in
the Second Chamber or lower house of parliament. The youngest
daughter, Mimi (Maria Clazina), born in 1806, stayed home a

little longer. She was married in 1828 to Johan Antoni Philipse, a
lawyer who first had a career in the justice system and later would
be president of the First Chamber or upper house and was fmally
honoured with an appointment as Minister of State. Between the
birth of the two daughters came the birth of their only son:
Guillaume, on August 21, 1801. The birth took place in "Vreugd
en Rust," the country-house an hour's ride by coach from The
Hague, the beautiful estate that Madame Groen had brought into
the marriage. It would later be said that there is nothing un-Dutch
about Groen van Prinsterer except his first name. Perhaps he owes
his French name to the fact that he was baptized in the Walloon
church of The Hague—in those days the church of the upper crust.
The question is not entirely clear. Use of the French language was
common among the upper classes at the time; Guillaume's mother
in particular spoke mostly French, although later she did
encourage her son to try and become proficient in Dutch as well.
Formative years
The childhood years of Willem Groen—for that was the Dutch-
language name his friends and family would mostly know him by
—were spent in his parental home, in the security of a loving and
genteel atmosphere. After 1805 the family spent the winter season
in The Hague, residing in a magnificent mansion along the Korte
Vijverberg, where the son, too, would live from 1838 till his death
in 1876. Father Groen started early with a systematic approach to
Willem's education. The boy quickly showed himself to be a
talented and promising lad, and we may safely assume that the
father had great plans for his only son. Had he not himself, by dint
of personal effort and through his marriage, gained acceptance in
the highest circles in the land? The best would not be good enough
for his son. Until his death in 1837, Papa Groen continued to keep
a close watch over his son's career.
Formative Years 5
This paternal care extended to the minutest details and accord-

ing to the custom of the time was wielded with unquestioned
authority, rather pedantically almost. But Willem never felt any-
thing like a generation conflict, and all his life he remained grateful
to his father for his many cares, even though he did not always
agree with his plans.
Willem Groen's first lessons were received at home, from his
father and from a governess. At the age of 8 he began to attend,
during the winter months, the private school run by the The Hague
chapter of the Society for the Common Utility. Utility schools had
a good reputation; in those days of educational renewal they
offered its most progressive form. In 1813 Willem for a short
while stayed at a boarding school in Haarlem, but the imminent
collapse of the French regime persuaded Papa Groen to call him
home again. Thus the 12-year-old was again living in The Hague
when the relatively bloodless revolution—more like a restora-
tion—of November 1813 took place. Possibly he witnessed the
parade of its leaders Count van Limburg Stirum and the young
Hogendorps, sporting their Orange cockades. He may have been
a spectator at the triumphal entry of the Prince of Orange, who
sailed from England and landed on a beach near The Hague. In
any case, he admired the Cossack liberators: their commander was
billeted in the home of the Groens and the young boy played chess
with him. After these events, for the next couple of years Willem
attended the local Latin School. Despite the difference in age he
developed a close friendship with his teacher, Professor Johannes
Kappeyne van de Coppello, a learned classical scholar who
expected great things from his gifted student. A half century later,
one of Kappeyne's sons would be a Liberal cabinet minister who
almost succeeded in rendering impossible the maintenance of non-
government schools of which Groen had become such a fervent
advocate.
In 1815 Dr. Groen sent his son to Utrecht, to the Hieronymus

School. This establishment was many centuries old but had been
completely reorganized shortly before. The boys were taught by an
excellent staff. Father Groen, who at this time still hoped that his
son would follow in his footsteps and take up medicine, saw to it
that Willem was enrolled not just in the courses that interested
him, such as Greek, Latin and History, but also in the sciences.
His broader education was not neglected either. Papa Groen
was very conscious of the importance of sound physical develop-
ment: walking, fives, golf, horseback-riding. Swimming came in
for attention as well, though the occasion for that was somewhat
remarkable. On one of his walks outside the city walls the 15-year-
old Willem had jumped into the river to save a girl that had fallen
in. "It could have cost you your life!" wrote the alarmed father.
The father was also convinced of the usefulness of social
contacts. A number of relatives and acquaintances were living in
Utrecht and the son was repeatedly encouraged to pay them a visit.
Willem obeyed faithfully and did not neglect to report to his father
about how the visits had gone. For his part, the father did empa-
thize with the fact that a walk with old Professor Van Geuns must
have seemed rather dull to his son with his zest for life.
Student years in Leyden

It was a foregone conclusion, of course, that the young Groen van
Prinsterer, who finished his secondary schooling in the spring of
1817, would go on to university. That was customary in his
circles. But what is more, Willem had always been at the top of his
class and had been selected to deliver many a prize oration—at
that time the duty and the honour of the best pupil in the school.
This was again the case upon his matriculation from the Utrecht
school, when Willem delivered a speech to a select audience, in
meticulous Latin, about the similarity between Cicero's politics
and his personality.
Formative Years 7
Which field of study would best suit the aptitude and talents of
the young man? At Leyden he enrolled in two faculties: law and
letters. His registration dates from May 1817 but his actual
attendance did not begin until early 1818, at which time he also
rented rooms along the Rapenburg canal.
Groen van Prinsterer would make intensive use of the five
years he spent in Leyden. We can gain a fairly good impression of
his university years from the entries he made in his journal. Willem
Groen devoured many books, and many kinds of books. Naturally,
he read the classics and the works in legal studies that were pre-
scribed for his courses. But he read them thoroughly, while also
browsing in many books that may have been recommended but
were not prescribed. He plowed his way through ancient and
modern literature, philosophy, law and history. There was little
that did not interest him.
But all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy. A uni-
versity student must not just be hitting the books; he has to have
a life! Naturally, the debating clubs that Groen joined bore solemn
names and had even more solemn aims. The papers that members
read to each other and the formal propositions they defended in
club meetings sound most solid and grave.
But much of that was also play-acting. And after half a homily
by Professor Johannes Henricus van der Palm and an hour of
reading Roman pandects Groen was glad to go out for a stroll and
look up a friend, enjoy a glass of wine and play a game of chess.
On warm summer afternoons he might go for tea at the home of a
professor or in a tea-house belonging to a family acquaintance
along a canal some distance from the city. There was time for
horseback-riding, a short excursion with friends in a brake and a
hired coachman, a Sunday walk to some well-known picnic spot
on the outskirts of Leyden. Groen and his companions knew how
to enjoy themselves. Pleasant in manners, a chap of good breeding
and unmistakable intelligence, Groen was popular with his fellow
students as well as with his professors. Relations between pro-

fessors and students could be quite personal in those days. The
universities were very small, having only a hundred or so students.
Almost all of them, moreover, came from the same social class and
the parents were often acquainted with one another. Groen was on
intimate terms with several of his professors, and bonds were
created that often lasted long after he graduated. The young
theologian and historian Elias Borger, whom Groen admired
greatly, died already in 1820, but Groen also adored the theologian
Van der Palm, who was all eloquence. Particularly warm was his
relation with Cornelis Jacobus van Assen, a professor of law, a
touch vain but good-natured, a conservative who for that reason
was not quite taken seriously by his stuffy liberal colleagues, yet
who therefore developed a keen eye for the shortcomings of those
same liberals—and who was able to express his opinions about
them in pithy language. Until his death in 1859 Van Assen would
be one of Groen's most faithful correspondents.
The real leader of the Leyden liberals was Joan Melchior
Kemper. It was typical of the inquisitive but unassuming and
cautious Groen that he got along famously with Kemper as well.
The latter was not just anybody. A jurist of Patriot convictions, he
had played a significant role in 1813 when the new state of The
Netherlands was constituted and launched. Kemper quickly spotted
Groen's abilities and even tried to get him appointed professor
before he had properly fmished his course of studies. And when
Kemper died in 1824 there was talk of making the 23-year-old
Groen his successor. Kemper, Borger, Van der Palm—the names
indicate the climate of opinion that reigned in Leyden during
Groen's university days: self-consciously Netherlandic, urbane,
and Protestant in the sense of a watered-down Calvinism, above all
liberal and moderate, reasonably confident in progress and
perfectibility.
Formative Years 9
Self-confidence, concord, reasonableness: these were the key

concepts of the time. It was generally believed that the old days
—the days of fierce partisan feuds between Orangists and Patriots,
between Jacobins and moderates, between libertines and puritans
—were a thing of the past. People would rather forget about them
altogether. The celebrated Proclamation of 1813—in effect the
official Declaration of Restored Independence—may have re-
assured the public, "The olden days are back," but it had added:
"Former antagonisms are put aside; what we have suffered is
forgiven and forgotten!" Partisan slogans must not be allowed to
disrupt the newly won unity and concord, all the more important
after the forced merger of Holland and Belgium into the United
Kingdom of the Netherlands. The generation of the Restoration of
1813, historian Johan Huizinga has quipped, wished above all to
lie down and rest under the Orange tree.
Bilderdijk's seminar
In that harmonious chorus of optimistic self-assurance, one stri-
dent dissonant was heard. The poet-lawyer Willem Bilderdijk had
come to live in Leyden in 1817, to establish himself as a private
tutor. His earlier aspiration, to be assigned a university chair, had
not been fulfilled. Now he hoped, in the very place where the
flower ofthe nation's youth was being trained for future leadership
of the country, to get a hearing for his ideas anyway. However dif-
ficult his circumstances would often be, and however loath the
eternal pessimist would have been to admit it to himself, Bilder-
dijk's years in Leyden were to be, from a national perspective, the
most significant phase of his life.
Bilderdijk's private seminar was never attended by more than
a handful of students. Yet that handful kept the torch burning.
Bilderdijk's lecture series was without rhyme or reason but he
dealt chiefly with Dutch history which he took very broadly.
Whatever occupied or fascinated the master—and what subject
under the sun did not interest him?—he would discuss at great
length, in a colourful mixture in which statements of profound and
great wisdom alternated with the most blatant fantasies and the
most glittering generalizations. But the students hung on his lips.
Every word this man uttered flowed from the mighty spirit of
Holland's only great Romantic. Despite and because of his many
idiosyncrasies, shortcomings, and errors of judgment, Bilderdijk
was a figure of great stature, someone with a message. Waging a
mighty struggle with the spirit of the age that had cast its spell
over so many, he lashed out at the mentality of comfortable com-
placency and cautious moderation. For behind that caution he
smelled the fear of dissenting views. Under the cloak of moderate
reasonableness he discerned man's faith in himself and his own
potentials. In people's self-confidence Bilderdijk recognized the
mind that had exchanged the depth of human misery and the
greatness of human depravity in the eyes of a holy God for the
effort at living the virtuous life in reliance on human reason and
good will. Bilderdijk, by contrast, knew of sin and unrighteous-
ness, and also of redemption and atonement through Christ's suf-
fering and death alone.
Groen van Prinsterer, too, attended Bilderdijk's private sem-
inar for a number of years. Of course, dear Willem, his father
wrote in answer to a question from his son, of course, go ahead
and attend Mr. Bilderdijk's lectures; I will gladly pay the fees. It
will be important as well as enjoyable for you to get to know and
hear a famous man like him, so it would be a pity if he were to
pass away and you had missed the opportunity of making his
acquaintance.
That's how things go. An alert student is loath to miss an
opportunity to go and hear a famous personality. And Groen's
father saw no harm in that. Bilderdijk might be a controversial
figure, he was also Holland's premier poet. And his critical-
Formative Years 11
minded son, accompanied by a group of friends, would surely be

proof against the seductive powers of the master.
That last calculation of father Groen's was perhaps a bit too
optimistic: many fathers afterwards came to rue the day they had
given their sons permission to sit at Bilderdijk's feet. Professor
David van Lennep had great difficulty weaning his son Jacob from
his "black period" of Bilderdijkianism, and Gijsbert Karel van
Hogendorp, one of the leaders of the Restoration of 1813, was
anything but happy about the ideas that his sons Willem and Dirk
began to vent in the fields of history and politics after being
"brainwashed" by Bilderdijk.
As far as that goes, however, Papa Groen had less reason to
complain. His son spent "wonderful hours" listening to the master
but was not taken in by the seductive charm of his eloquence. "My
esteem for Bilderdijk in many ways is almost unlimited," he would
write later, but he added at once that he had always had reserva-
tions in regard to the master and many of his ideas. By upbringing
and character Willem was not the person to surrender himself
holus-bolus to someone like Bilderdijk. He was endowed with too
much of an independent spirit and a critical mind. Above all, he
was not of Bilderdijk's faith.
All this is not to say that Bilderdijk had no influence on him
whatsoever. Bilderdijk set the young Groen to thinking. His
lectures triggered a process of doubt about the very things most
people of the time considered self-evident. What probably fasci-
nated Groen most about Bilderdijk was his historical insight.
Bilderdijk's treatment of Dutch history was one continuous
harangue against the prevailing historical consensus. It was a
polemic that he waged with the full force of his personality.
History for Bilderdijk was not just a hobby or an intellectual game;
it was a matter of vital importance. After all, as one of his poems
says, "In the past lieth the present / in today that which will be."
Sometimes his polemic was coarse; on occasion his attacks on the
eighteenth-century historian Jan Wagenaar were beside the mark:

the precise lumber merchant Wagenaar was a much more solid
worker than Bilderdijk. But Bilderdijk had style, and he had a
vision—a vision which at certain points was superior to the
burgher interpretations of Wagenaar, who had voiced the unal-
loyed anti-Orangist version of history popular among the Regents
or ruling classes.
Bilderdijk's presence in Leyden did not fail to have conse-
quences. A number of his pupils swallowed the words of the
master whole. Full of youthful fire, they adopted his battle-cries.
And where better to express their new-found insights than in their
doctoral dissertations? In direct defiance of the reigning spirit of
moderation they assailed the doctrine of popular sovereignty with
blazing conviction. They argued vehemently against the old Regent
version of Holland's past: not the oligarchs had of old possessed
the sovereignty, but the princes.
During the defence of their theses in public meetings of the
university senate, heated debates would flare up. The learned
Matthijs Siegenbeek was the antipode to Bilderdijk in everything;
they disagreed about the art of poetry, about spelling, about his-
tory. Going over the heads of the doctoral candidates, Siegenbeek
would direct his attack at the intellectual father of their disserta-
tions—old man Bilderdijk, sitting in the back of the hall, laughing
in his sleeve. Beardless youths, declaimed Professor Siegenbeek,
ought not to adopt the magic incantations of one man who was
disrupting the national peace and concord. Professor Kemper in his
turn found it necessary on one occasion to deliver himself of a
solemn speech about the value of sober-mindedness and tolerance.
Interventions of that kind availed little. The issues were too
real for that. Students from the University of Groningen once
threatened to give Dirk van Hogendorp a good thrashing, but
Bilderdijk's shield-bearers could not be deterred: undaunted, they
unfurled the banner. They had something to say, and they would
Formative Years 13
say it. The most sensational instance was the appearance in

August, 1823 of a pamphlet with the titillating title Grievances
Against the Spirit of the Age, authored by Isaac da Costa.
Defiantly it asked the reader: "Do you think you are living in an
age of liberty, of enlightenment, of progress? Think again. Such
blind arrogance! This is an age of slavery, of superstition, of idol-
atry, of ignorance and darkness." Da Costa noted regress in every
area where people thought they could see wonderful progress. In
the area of religion, he held forth, the true biblical doctrine has
been exchanged for private opinion and an optimistic view of man.
Politically, the proper, organic constitutional law, according to
which the prince rules his people like a father, has been exchanged
for the foolish doctrine of a social contract. And where is there
progress in the arts, in morals, in education? Potboilers seem to be
the extent of literary production; urban centres, rife with sin, mark
the moral corruption; and education only teaches children pseudo-
wisdom and a desire for material things.
Da Costa, a young man of Jewish birth and a recent convert to
Christianity, flung his accusations of halfness, conceit, apathy,
worldliness into the face of his new co-religionists, without
restraint or compromise. If Bilderdijk felt, as he was to write, that
his pupil's prose had been too temperate rather than too vehement,
many readers thought otherwise. The home of Da Costa—"the
monkey of the great baboon Bilderdijk," as one newspaper called
him—was for a while under police surveillance. Did the authorities
expect "the disturber of the peace" to convert his counter-
revolutionary doctrine directly into a coup d'etat, or did they wish
to protect him against attacks on his house?
A double doctorate
In that same year 1823, Groen van Prinsterer passed his qualifying
examinations, opening the door to earning a doctorate by writing
a thesis. He decided to write two, one in each of the faculties he
was enrolled in. Meanwhile, he was a close witness of the mount-

ing debate in the academy. Like everyone else, he attended the
defence ceremonies of the Bilderdijkians; in the case of Dirk van
Hogendorp he was even invited to be one of the designated
opponents. For that matter, Groen had been present at the baptism
of Da Costa, his wife Hanna, and their cousin Abraham Capadose,
in the Pilgrim's Church of Leyden on October 20, 1822. It was an
event, he wrote to his parents, "that I shall not easily forget." Yet,
however much he was an interested spectator of all this, his heart
was not yet touched. He could not give himself fully to any of the
parties in the debate.
Meanwhile, his own course of studies demanded much of his
attention. His plan to top off his well-spent university years with
a double doctorate required considerable preparation. A subject for
a dissertation in the Faculty of Letters was decided upon rather
quickly: a description of the historical figures that are mentioned
in the works of Plato. The eminent Professor Bake was to be the
supervisor. Finding a suitable topic for the Law Faculty was more
difficult. Several advisors had to be consulted. Finally he chose to
throw himself into a study of the merits of the Justinian Code, that
great summary of Roman law that would be so influential in
centuries to follow.
It was typical of Groen's capacity for work and his intellectual
powers that he completed both studies in a single year. The public
defence was set for December 17, 1823. At ten o'clock in the
morning he had to defend the dissertation in law, one hour later the
dissertation in letters. Everybody in academic Leyden was present
for this unusual event. Willem Groen was a kind and pleasant
young man, a member of many student societies, and the scholarly
joust was awaited with eager anticipation. Expectations were not
disappointed. We have not, commented Professor Van Assen, seen
such ready wit and power of expression since Elias Borger (who
had been the intellectual prodigy at the beginning of the century).
Formative Years 15
Groen's defence, according to another witness, was far above the

ordinary in the conciseness and calmness of his rebuttal and in the
purity and facility of his Latin. "To speak Latin like Willem
Groen" was for a while such a well-known expression that his
classmate Jacob van Lennep would later quote it in one of his
novels.
In search of a job
With two doctoral degrees, what was the young academic to do
next? Certain curators of Leyden University, friends of Groen,
wanted to have him succeed the late lamented Kemper. It almost
happened. Groen was more or less preparing himself for an
inaugural oration and had begun to collect material for lectures,
when the Minister of Home Affairs decided that the aspiring
professor, clever though he was, knew too little about the dis-
cipline he would have to teach. And so the chair went to someone
else. Next, Groen was approached about becoming a professor at
the Athenaeum in the city of Deventer, but he must have declined,
for nothing came of it. But what then? Not that Groen van
Prinsterer was unemployed. Immediately upon graduation he had
registered as a barrister and set up office in The Hague—wisely
under the supervision of an older, experienced colleague. He liked
practising law better than he had thought (apparently his expec-
tations had not been very high), but the work did not give him
much satisfaction. Fortunately, as he noted himself, not too many
clients knocked on his door, leaving him ample time for study.
Father Groen had followed his son's uncertain steps into civil-
ian life with disappointment. Dr. Groen had always nurtured high
expectations with respect to his son. That is why he had so care-
fully attended to his education. Now was the time to start reaping
the fruits. A university chair would have been nice, but there were
other possibilities. He would most want his son to choose a career
in political administration. He had the ability and the education-
of that father Groen was convinced. First, however, the young

intellectual, who looked at the world with a head full of bookish
knowledge, would have to get some practical administrative
experience. Father Groen checked off his relations. Letters of
recommendation were gathered, applications submitted—at the
Secretariat of Holland, at the King's Cabinet. The son showed
little enthusiasm. A desk job did not appeal to him. He had aspira-
tions in another direction: to become the national historian. That
suited his bent, his interests, as well as his training. In December
1826 the King had issued an invitation to "all men of letters in the
nation" to submit outlines of a general history of the Netherlands.
That work would have to be based on all known as well as
unpublished sources and was intended "to cultivate love of
country, promote civic virtue, and preserve the national interest."
The author of the best outline would be appointed "Historian of
the Realm" and be enabled to work out his project.
"I set to work at once," Groen relates in his autobiography.
Actually, he was already preoccupied with it, because a few weeks
before the King's decree Groen had given a speech about "reasons
for making our national history better known." He sent the speech
to the King, followed half a year later by his "Essay on the Com-
position of a General History of the Fatherland." That essay was
one of the five that the jury picked as the best among the 44
outlines received. The five authors each received a gold medal and
their outlines were published without cost. Yet no "Historian ofthe
Realm" was ever appointed. A position of that kind had been
desired by King William in particular in order to have the history
promote unity between the northern and southern parts of the
kingdom (today's Holland and Belgium). But that unity was
increasingly being eroded. The result of the history contest was not
announced until 1830, after an interim report in 1828 that made no
mention of an appointment.
Formative Years 17
During the long delay Papa Groen put his foot down and had
his son apply for the post of Secretary in the King's Cabinet.
There were other applicants and a few tense months followed.
Who would get the job? For part of the time Groen went for a
holiday to Paris, but his father kept him informed and lobbied his
connections in order to procure the position for his son. The son
meanwhile tried to forget the approaching calamity by enjoying the
various amusements Paris had to offer vacationers from abroad.
Warned by his father, he avoided the casino, but he found the
opera "magnificent." The stay afforded not only amusement but
also several useful contacts. Groen's name was known in academic
circles from his published dissertations, so he had easy access to
all sorts of people. That is how Victor Cousin, the editor of a pres-
tigious French journal, came to persuade Groen to submit regular
contributions for his journal about the latest developments and
publications in the Netherlands.
Back from Paris, Groen paid a visit to the palace. The King
had said he would like to meet the young man who wanted to be
his secretary. Evidently, the meeting went well, for in September
1827 he was appointed Secretary in the King's Cabinet. A steady
job at last! But Groen was to experience the next six years with
mixed feelings. The King's Cabinet was not a Council ofMinisters
but rather the central hinge in the King's administrative apparatus.
William I was a man of an aristocratic disposition, entrusted with
wide powers and surrounded by few subjects of equal caliber. No
wonder he ran a highly personal one-man government. He had
ministers, but they had no independence or responsibility; they
were mere clerks to the King, who hired and fired them at will.
Some ministers were able, others not so able men who prepared
and carried out the decrees of His Majesty. As for parliament, it
hardly represented the people at that time because elections were
indirect and few had the vote. Thus parliament, like the ministers,
exercised no checks on the government. It was not able to do so,
1 8 Groen van Prinsterer
and it was scarcely interested in doing so. The upper house, for
example, was sometimes referred to as "the king's stable."
In this autocratic, highly centralized system of government, the
King's Cabinet had an important role to play. The Cabinet
received instructions from the King and passed these on to the
government departments concerned; and inversely, the proposals,
questions and reports from the entire civil service arrived at the
Cabinet for submission to the King. Thus the workload of the
Cabinet was not insignificant, but its items varied greatly in
substance. At times it consisted in no more than the summarizing
and copying of all kinds of documents and recommendations—
very time-consuming and rather boring. It would cause Groen to
sigh that he had "perhaps the most slavish job in the land." At
other times the work was much more interesting and the weightiest
state papers passed through Groen's hands or had to be composed
by him when the King required specific advice.
Groen did not find all that much satisfaction in his work and in
the long run his health suffered under it (especially after the
outbreak of the Belgian revolt the Cabinet was clearly under-
staffed). Yet his position had an unmistakable impact on his per-
sonal development. He learned to know political administration
and government policy from the inside, as well as the personalities
involved. First of all, of course, King William I—the "Merchant-
King," as he was known, thanks to his sponsorship of economic
measures to restore the country's commercial position in the
world. Groen had his reservations with respect to the person and
policies of the King, whose personality was not particularly
scintillating in any case; if anything, it was dour, reserved and
rather prosaic. But Groen was impressed by the King's enormous
capacity for work and his high ideals, and by the scope of his task
and the energy he devoted to it.
Formative Years 19
Courtship and marriage

If the year 1827 and his acceptance of the post in the Cabinet was
of great consequence for the life of Groen van Prinsterer, even
more important that year was his engagement, followed six months
later by his marriage. That summer, a young woman from the
northern province of Groningen—her name was Elisabeth van der
Hoop—stayed for a few weeks with the Groen family at "Vreugd
en Rust." She was a distant relative and this visit was not the first
meeting for either party. At the end of her stay in Voorburg,
Willem Groen declared his love to this friend of his sister Mimi.
She did not know what to reply and begged for time to think it
over. That time turned out favourably for Groen and at the begin-
ning of August 1827 he travelled to "De Bult," the country estate
of the Van der Hoops, just south of the town of Steenwijk.
Betsy (for that was the name she was known by) was born on
February 6, 1807, the daughter of Abraham Johan van der Hoop,
an attorney who had died the year before, and Arnoldina Thomas-
sen a Thuessink. They were of the same social status as the
Groens. Mr. van der Hoop had been an alderman in the city coun-
cil of Groningen. His daughter had received a very good education.
She was to be a good helpmeet for her husband, also intellectually;
she would write or copy almost all his letters after 1845, when his
hand increasingly bothered him. She was also to look after the
administration of their extensive properties. But the gifts of her
heart surpassed even those of her head. Next to a sound intellect,
Betsy possessed an independent spirit, clear insight, and a lot of
tact. As well, she gave a great deal of loving attention to those
needy people whom she felt were placed on her path. She knew the
Bible text, "Of whom much has been given, much shall be re-
quired" She was a very pious woman who asked herself at every
step she took whether that step was according to the will of God.
Raised in the Reformed religion, her life of faith was deepened by
influences from the Revell, the religious revival of the early
decades of the nineteenth century that began in Geneva and spread

throughout western Europe, including the Low Countries. Her
pious faith, joined to her natural modesty, made her averse to the
kind of society life that was expected of people like the Groens.
Not that she made a demonstration of it—she came where she
knew she was obligated to, but stayed away wherever that was
possible. In that, she was a stark contrast to Groen's mother, who
enjoyed a busy social life and loved going to parties and balls.
On the 21' of May in the year 1828, in the City Hall of

Groningen, Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer, Secretary in
the King's Cabinet, and Elisabeth Maria Magdalena van
der Hoop, of no occupation, declared in a loud voice, in the
presence of the clerk of the civil registry and five witnesses
[Betsy's mother, two brothers, an uncle and a cousin}, that
they take each other to be husband and wife.
Thus reads the marriage certificate. After the wedding the young
couple travelled to Brussels, where the King and the Government
were stationed that year, and started their home in "a cheerful and
darling house." In 1829 they moved back to The Hague, into a
small house on the Haagse Voorhout, which they exchanged in
1832 for one on Plein Square.
Groen's spiritual growth

Humanly speaking, Groen's marriage was of decisive significance
for his further development and for the rest of his life. Allard
Pierson put his finger on it when he wrote: "Groen arrived where
he arrived on the hand of a woman." Thanks to her fervent,
experiential faith and her strong Reformed convictions, laced with
a puritan strain, she was the means by which Groen van Prinsterer
too was led to accept Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour. As he
wrote in his autobiography:
Formative Years 21
I had the privilege of receiving a very religious upbringing,

in and outside the home. The outcome confined itself,
however, to an intellectual conviction and to a desire to live
a virtuous life, to earn and gain respectability. . . . After
finishing university I participated in the outward forms of
religious observances, but without any particular interest,
and occupied myself with various studies, while always
regarding religion much more as something separate than
as a life principle that ought to be united and interwoven
with our entire existence.
This testimony of Groen about himself is confirmed by many other

facts. In his parental home, the family had attended church
regularly, and Dr. Groen had his son take catechism lessons from
the then renowned Reverend Isaac Dermout, who was an enthu-
siastic proponent of the new polity of the Dutch Reformed Church.
Willem had made public profession of his faith in the Easter
service of 1818, in preparation of which he had read a book by
Hieronymous van Alphen, a work that was "exceptionally suitable
for acquiring clear and correct notions of the cardinal truths of the
Christian Religion." At university, too, Groen did not lose touch
with church or religion. More than once he noted in his journal that
he had heard a "splendid sermon." He was a regular reader of the
volumes of sermons by Van der Palm, which he found "very
edifying"—naturally, since the young Groen had a good ear for the
well-crafted pulpit style of Van der Palm, whose Christianity was
as mellifluent as his oratorical talent. On the whole, Groen got
along quite comfortably with the spirit of the times. He was intel-
lectually convinced of the correctness of a reasonable, Christian,
Protestant faith which, when presented in cultured dress, could
also please one's aesthetic sensibilities and form the indispensable
basis—both personally and socially—for a morally anchored life
of virtue.
Still, Groen van Prinsterer was a seeker. Perhaps he didn't

realize it all that much himself The settled opinions in politics,
scholarship and religion, however, did not fully give him intellec-
tual and emotional satisfaction.
Groen's spiritual journey, though very much a highly personal
development of course, did take place in a certain context. The
twenties and thirties of the nineteenth century were the period in
the history of the Netherlands when romanticism vied with classi-
cism and enlightenment for control of men's minds. Groen's pa-
rental home and the university in Leyden were dominated by an
atmosphere of moderate rationalism, drenched in classicism and a
belief in progress. That put a stamp on the spiritual life of Groen
and his circle and also conditioned his intellectual activities.
But an intelligent and engaged young man like Groen also
came into contact with more modern views. Bilderdijk set him to
doubt the self-evidence of the rationalist worldview. And there
were also new developments in the world of learning. Writers like
the German jurist Friedrich Carl von Savigny rebelled against the
accepted views of science, which were heavily influenced by
natural law, and demanded attention for historical development.
Others, like Carl Ludwig von Haller, Joseph de Maistre and
Félicité de Lamennais, challenged the doctrines of popular sover-
eignty and social contract and developed theories in which the
divine origin of authority and the monarchs' claim to absolute
power were defended against the notion of the popular will and
democracy, fallacies that were based on society's presumed origin
in a voluntary association of people.
If historians had depicted the past as the steady progress of
reason in human affairs, as factual evidence for cultural optimism,
the Romantics placed huge question marks behind that optimism.
They pointed to the seamy sides of human existence; they put
powerless, puny man over against the mighty, mysterious forces
of nature, as a tiny creature in the hand of an omnipotent God.
Formative Years 23
Groen's entire upbringing and all of his formal education were de-
signed to shape him into an intellectual who always looked at both
sides of the issue. Thus his growth to intellectual-spiritual maturity
proceeded very slowly. His very training caused him to weigh
things carefully and to keep a tight rein on his thirst for truth.
In political respects Groen was a child of his time—"a con-
servative liberal or a liberal conservative, depending on the way
the wind blew," as he later said of himself. We might say: a right-
of-centre liberal or a progressive conservative, as circumstances
dictated. His work in the King's Cabinet brought him into daily
contact with the world of politics. From close-up he became
acquainted with the strength and weaknesses of a personal,
absolutistic government. Conservatism and liberalism demanded
his attention. His trained mind looked for the principles and
backgrounds behind the events of the day. In the face of the
manoeuvers of His Majesty's pragmatic approach and the whirl of
international relations in which different systems competed for pre-
eminence, and in contrast to the writings of liberals in Holland and
the actions of ultra-Catholics and radical liberals in Belgium,
Groen longed for a Netherlandic approach to politics, one founded
on firm principles and rooted in the nation's history. He began to
develop a deep interest in the relation between religion and politics;
he started to read books on church history in an attempt to find
answers to his questions. During many hours of boring debates in
the Second Chamber, which he had to attend as part of his job, he
would read the works of the great British anti-revolutionary
Edmund Burke.
Netherlandic Reflections
The conduct of the Belgian opposition to the King's policies forced
Groen to study liberalism. The liberals of the South were more
radical, and also more anti-clerical, than the liberals of the North.
They declared openly that the people were the rightful sovereign.
Time and again they clashed with the paternalistic rule of the
King.
The mounting tension in the United Kingdom reinforced
Groen's desire to have a voice of his own in the affairs of the day.
He felt he should try to contribute to a possible solution to the
conflict threatening the kingdom through the avenue of journalism.
When Anthony van Rappard, a friend from university days and
like Groen a civil servant, sounded him out about starting a new
journal, Groen iinmediately reacted positively. October 2, 1829
saw the publication of the first issue of Nederlandsche Gedachten
or "Netherlandic Reflections." It was a pamphlet of 4 pages, with
unsigned editorials, mailed free of charge at 12'/2 cents per issue
plus 11/2 cents for a newspaper stamp. Its opening editorial stated
that to remain silent any longer would not be a sign of patriotism,
now that the South was dominated by a very dangerous faction.
Liberalism was uniting people of diverse intentions in an in-
creasingly more vehement attack on the Constitutional Monarchy,
on Protestantism, and on the character of the Netherlandic people.
The paper wished to expose the fanaticism of that faction and
counter the falsehood of their principles.
Groen kept up the publication of Nederlandsche Gedachten
for almost three years, filling its 122 issues almost single-handed-
ly, for although he had associates the brunt of the work was borne
by him. He also bore the financial load, so that the small number
of subscribers at last forced him to discontinue the paper.
The basic premises of Nederlandsche Gedachten were the
defence of the constitutional monarchy and the maintenance of the
historic, Protestant character of the country. Groen was in favour
of the United Kingdom. North and South were sufficiently
common in language and nationality to develop into a political
unit, a unit which to him seemed highly desirable from an inter-
national point of view: only a strong Netherlands would be a
match for France. Thus when a revolt broke out in Belgium in
Formative Years 25
August 1830, Groen's condemnation was vehement. Immediately

he linked the rebels in Brussels to the revolutionaries who a few
months earlier had toppled the king of France and installed a new
king of the French. Memories of events during a still earlier
revolution in France haunted his mind. Wrote Groen: "The flame
of evil, which has once again been fanned from France, is spread-
ing across the adjacent kingdoms with amazing speed. Liberalism,
offspring of Jacobin fanaticism, threatens the people of the
Netherlands." Groen had only one label for the Belgian revolt:
rebellion, and only one remedy: to maintain legitimate authority
with all the means at its disposal. How bitterly disappointed he
was when he felt obliged to record in his journal that the officials
in charge responded but weakly to the rebels and seemed ready to
give in to them. Negotiations, concessions, retreat—he roundly
condemned them all as reprehensible yielding to the revolutionary
mind, which is never satisfied in any case. Not that Groen
approved of all the government measures prior to August 1830 or
that he had no eye for the justified grievances of the Belgians. But
predominant for him was the right of government and the interest
of the country. In fact, for the sake of the country he was soon
willing to grant independence to the Belgians, who clearly did not
want to belong to the Netherlands and who appeared thoroughly
infected by the revolutionary germ of liberalism. As early as the
issue of September 30, 1830 Groen concluded that the separation
was a fact. The power to undo that fact was lacking. Let us resign
ourselves to that fact, he wrote, and recognize Belgium's
independence before the revolution penetrates to the North.
Hopefully Belgium can then fulfil the function of being a retaining
wall against French expansionism. Groen now deemed an indepen-
dent Belgium acceptable after all.
Groen resumed his analysis of the fate of the United Kingdom
in 1832. Looking back, he pointed out that the manner in which
North and South were unified in 1815 had completely neglected
the differences in national character of both sections. That funda-

mental error had been aggravated by the fact that the policies of
King William had aimed at imposing too northern a character on
the country as a whole, in disregard of the distinctive structures of
southern society. Only a radical and general separation could now
restore justice.
Groen's analyses and assessments show his independent char-
acter. Before August 1830 Nederlandsche Gedachten, with its
appeal for upholding the constitutional order, looked like a paper
in support of the government. During the first months of the revolt,
when Groen would not hear of compromise, the paper's criticism
of official policy—still of a partial nature only, yet often already
quite vehement—cannot have been agreeable to the government.
Nor can it have been agreeable when Groen already at an early
stage began to call for a complete and definitive separation while
the King persisted for many years in a different policy. Although
Groen did his best to maintain anonymity he was not entirely suc-
cessful, at any rate not with the King. Nevertheless, Groen never
experienced difficulties from the side of officialdom. On one
occasion he believed he had aroused the King's displeasure. He
promptly offered his resignation as Secretary of the King's
Cabinet—but it was refused.
Taking stock
The editorship of Nederlandsche Gedachten forced Groen to try
to account for the political events of his time. He was not yet an
anti-revolutionary in 1829. But he was a Netherlandic patriot, con-
stitutionally minded, more a conservative than an avowed liberal—
as indicated by his collaboration with Van Rappard. But neither
was he an ideological conservative. Groen's close acquaintance
with the Belgian Revolt deepened his insight into political prin-
ciples—a ripening process that was also connected with his faith
development.
Formative Years 27
More and more Groen began to recognize the true nature of

liberal thought. An outward sign of this growing insight was a long
and increasingly acrimonious exchange between Nederlandsche
Gedachten en De Noordstar, the paper of the more progressive
liberals in the northern Netherlands edited by F. A. van Hall.
Groen wondered what might explain the popularity of the liberal
ideas. He began to investigate the historical background of lib-
eralism and conservatism.
Was the separation between religious beliefs and political
ideals, a separation hitherto considered only natural, really so self-
evident, he asked? And religious belief itself—what was its core,
its function, its operation? Of course Groen knew about the
religious revival movement in his own country and elsewhere
which sought to extract Christianity from the rigidity of orthodoxy
and its erosion by deism, in order to have faith become a life-prin-
ciple once again. The Revell restored the Bible as a book for the
home because Bible study, not this or that systematic theology or
church polity, was to be the point of departure for a Christian life
of genuine piety. It was alongside, sometimes outside, the official
church that the friends of the Réveil experienced their warm and
intimate, Christ-centered faith, marked by a kind of romantic
pietism. They put a great deal of emphasis on personal conversion
and witnessing for Christ in word and deed in as wide a circle as
possible.
Groen had heard Bilderdijk; he was a friend of his disciples.
Especially through his marriage he came to know more and more
people who belonged to the Revell, such as Rev. Isaac Secrétan,
Hendrik Jacob Koenen, Willem Messchert, the inspired Willem de
Clercq. In Brussels the couple attended the chapel services led by
the court chaplain, Jean-Henri Merle d'Aubigné. His messages,
calling the sinner to surrender to Christ, touched Groen's heart and
gradually prepared him to surrender. "In the last three or four
years," Groen confided in 1831 to his friend Van Rappard,
a thousand things have become clear to me which I had

once regarded as unsolvable riddles, and the whole of
history is becoming for me one continuous confirmation of
the truths revealed to us in Holy Scripture. But the faith by
which one becomes a new creation, by which in place of
one's own will and passion the desire to serve God holds
sway, . . . that faith I do not have, or in any case have only
in such small measure that I am barely conscious of it
myself. And yet that faith is absolutely essential. It has to
be given us. Daily prayer and Bible reading are the means
to acquire it. . . . I continually recognize God's guidance
in the events of my life and am beginning to have more
trust in the help of Him who will finish His good work in
me.
Half a year later Groen confided to De Clercq: "I wish I could

pray so simply and so from the heart as you do." In the summer
of 1832 the Groens regularly attended the church services con-
ducted by Rev. Dirk Molenaar, an orthodox preacher who some
years earlier had written An Address to All My Reformed Co-
religionists, in which he had issued a rousing call for remaining
faithful to the historic confessions and as a result of which he had
suffered many indignities. "My Willem no longer talks about
Molenaar's delivery," wrote Betsy to a friend, "but only about his
sermons, which he found excellent when I heard much repetition."
She was profoundly thankful for the spiritual change in her
husband.
In January 1833, a few days after the death of his mother,
Groen van Prinsterer became seriously ill. The heavy workload
and inner tensions had undermined his congenitally weak con-
stitution. For many weeks Betsy feared the worst, but on Sunday
evening of January the 27 th she was able to report to their mutual
friend De Clercq: "Yes, truly, great cause for thanks! Everything
Formative Years 29
is much better than yesterday. For the first time a cheerful face of
the doctors." Mrs. Groen was also thankful for another reason:
during his illness Willem Groen had found his peace in complete
surrender to his heavenly Father.
In June of that year Groen had recovered well enough that he
was able to travel up the Rhine to Switzerland for further conva-
lescence. Toward the end of August Mr. and Mrs. Groen returned
home, full of memories of the trip's experiences, of their meetings
with old and new friends, and gladdened by having been allowed
to meet people everywhere with whom, it turned out, they shared
the love of Christ. The glory of the mountains, the beauty of the
Rhine valley, so different from the flat countryside of Holland,
had made them more sensible of the greatness of the Creator. For
a short time Groen resumed his work at the Cabinet, but on
December 7, 1833 Groen received his honourable discharge as
Secretary of the King's Cabinet. The state of his health no longer
allowed him to continue the office work, which he had grown to
dislike more and more in any case, particularly given his increas-
ing disenchantment with the King's policy.
The publication of Nederlandsche Gedachten had already
ceased toward the end of July, 1832. There were few subscribers
and it was financially indefensible to continue publication. A new
period had begun in the life of Groen. His formative years were
over. The months of illness and convalescence had been the
closing phase of his spiritual development. The seeker had found
the Rock of Ages.
Chapter 2
In the Nursery of History
he letter of 1833 in which the King gave his secretary an

T honourable discharge contained the notice that Groen van
Prinsterer "shall continue to be charged with the supervision of
Our Family Archives, in accordance with Our Decree of the 29th
of October 1831."
Royal archivist
With that, Groen's life entered upon a new phase. Professor Carel
Gerretson, the first editor of the volumes of Groen's correspon-
dence, has given a pointed characterization of this move to the
Royal Archives: "Delivered from the prison of the King's Cabinet,
Groen started in the Family Archives of the House of Orange on
his pilgrimage to the past in search of the fountainhead of our
national strength."
We recall Groen's desire to become Historian of the Realm.
That desire had not been fulfilled, but when the superintendent of
the Royal Archives died the King had appointed Groen in his
place. That was in October of 1831, as noted above. Three days
later Groen had taken a first look at the collection now entrusted
to his care, to come away with the sad conclusion that in relation
to what really needed to be done he would be able to spend but
little time on it. In December of 1833, this all changed with his
discharge from the Cabinet. Day after day he began to spend his
mornings amidst the rich collection of historical documents that the
House of Orange had amassed in the course of centuries, starting
In the Nursery of History 31
with the archival pieces from the time of the founder of the
dynasty, William of Orange (1533-84), who was also the founder
of the Dutch state.
Groen quickly realized that the publication of the most impor-
tant documents would be a marvellous task, but also one that
would require much preparation. He discovered in addition that he
would have to look for supplementary material in archives else-
where in Europe. Thanks to support from the King, who was inter-
ested in Groen's work and who provided an extra monthly stipend,
Groen in 1836 went on a research trip for half a year, travelling
from archive to archive in Germany and France. Betsy Groen
accompanied her husband on the journey. Apart from the official
work, they again used the opportunity to visit tourist sites and to
meet all sort of people: scholars of various description, politicians
and statesmen, German family members ofthe House of Orange—
and especially, of course, friends of the Revell like César Malan,
Henri Grandpiérre and Frederic Monod in Paris, and Merle
d'Aubigné in Geneva.
In March 1835 the first volume appeared of the Archives ou
correspondance inédite de la Maison d'Orange Nassau. Groen
-
would edit 13 volumes in all, covering the period 1552 to 1688.

Each volume of the Archives contained lengthy "Prolégomènes"
—introductions in which Groen summarized the contents of the
volume. These Introductions alone are important pieces of historio-
graphy, all in French, which despite attempts to do so have never
been translated or published separately. Each time, Groen pointed
to the significance of the documents now made public and called
attention to the extent to which they corrected existing historical
accounts. He also gave an account of his method of editing,
explaining that he was publishing everything he had come across
that was in any way of historical significance, omitting only that
which he felt did not meet that criterion or was unfit for public
airing. For Groen wanted to go back to the oldest possible sources.

That was the newly gained insight of historical science in his day.
A debate on method
The publication of the Archives also toppled some sacred cows,
long-standing opinions and legendary events. On occasion, certain
historical figures were knocked from their pedestal and attacked in
their putative heroic role because the archives brought to light
some less pretty deeds and traits. Not everyone accepted this
gratefully. Thus Maurits Cornelis van Hall was so scandalized by
what Groen had written about Hendrik van Brederode, one of the
members of League of Nobles of 1566, that despite his advanced
age he took up the pen and composed a 240-page book entitled In
Defence of Hendrik Count of Brederode, Co-founder of Nether-
landic Liberty. In his younger days Van Hall had been a fiery
Patriot, but now he was a respectable, stately and conservative
man with resounding titles like Member of the Council of State,
Commander in the Order of the Netherlandic Lion, member of the
Royal Academy of Science, Letters and the Fine Arts—certainly
someone from the intellectual circles in the land. A man, too, who
possibly was not without influence: his son, Floris Adriaan van
Hall, was the King's most important minister. Groen had written
that Brederode did not deserve the praise which party spirit had
wasted on him, neither for his character, which merited little
commendation, nor for his morals, which were quite dissolute, nor
yet for his abilities, which were rather mediocre. That was a harsh
judgment about a man who in the anti-Orangist or Statist version
of Dutch history had sometimes been praised to the skies as the
great commander of the League of Nobles and the foremost leader
in the sixteenth-century revolt against Spain. Groen had arrived at
his verdict on the basis of the documents published in the
Archives, a verdict that was later confirmed from a number of
other sources he had studied but which he had decided to omit as
they had little significance for the political history and in some
cases suffered from obscene content. Van Hall, however, was of
the opinion that Groen had gone much too far. In his view, Groen
had not only rendered a biased interpretation of the data about
Brederode but had also vilified the man—and all this on the basis
of an utterly wrong standpoint, according to Van Hall, an immoral
standpoint in fact: Groen had taken Brederode's intimate private
correspondence and exposed it to the view of the general public.
Van Hall's defence of Brederode, although softly worded, was
a vicious attack on Groen's integrity as a working historian.
Imagine, to besmirch and vilify a national hero, as Groen had
done, and at the same time to proclaim about such well-known
monsters as King Philip II, Cardinal Granvelle and the Duke of
Alva that they were not those black demons that popular opinion
had always called them! It was Van Hall's intention to have his
attack undermine Groen's position as royal archivist by making
him suspect in the eyes of the King as a poor historian, a bad
patriot, and an assailant of national traditions and national unity.
Groen was not slow in his reply. He was always at his best as
a polemicist and stylist whenever his deepest convictions were
attacked. Despite the courtesy he observed toward his aged and
eminent opponent, his Antwoord aan Mr. M C. van Hall tore the
latter's position to shreds. If Van Hall had read my Archives more
closely, if he had been willing to have his misplaced preference for
Brederode corrected by the facts, he would not have disgraced
himself as badly as he has done—that, in essence, was Groen's
reply to Van Hall. I have not vilified Brederode—the man was no
better. It is not the task of the historian to preserve precious
traditions but to tell the truth, even if it is unpleasant. To be sure,
in doing so the historian ought to observe a measure of delicacy.
But he must never go as far as Van Hall demands, namely that
private correspondence may only be made public with the consent
of the writer. If that rule were really valid we might as well shut
down historical science—in which case Van Hall would not have
been able to write his defence of Brederode either!
Fellow historians like Reinier Bakhuizen van den Brink and
Robert Fruin—spiritual kin of Van Hall more than of Groen-
openly supported Groen in his defence of modern historiography,
and if it had not been for his attack on Groen, Van Hall would
today be quite forgotten as an historian. So complete was Groen's
methodological victory that he garnered the title "father of modern
Dutch historiography."
After six volumes of the Archives had appeared between 1835
and 1841, volume seven was longer in coming. The reason for that
delay must in part be sought in other labours—in 1840, for
example, Groen served as a member of parliament, and afterwards
much time and attention was taken up by work on a Crown Com-
mission for Education and also by ecclesiastical affairs. But the
main reason was that Groen began to realize more and more, as he
made headway with publishing the Archives, that with a scholarly
publication of this kind he would only partially achieve his goal.
Groen's view of history

For Groen van Prinsterer, the study of history was a matter of
great importance as well as practical usefulness. "In the past lies
the present," as Bilderdijk had said, giving voice to a common
notion of the time that was also warmly affirmed by Groen. The
study of history is a means of getting to know one's own time; it
is a school for everyone who wants to become familiar with the
processes and structures of human affairs. It also helps one to gain
insight into the power of evil and the limits to what man can do.
But besides these practical lessons, the study of history in
particular had religious value for Groen. History realizes God's
plan with the world. He guides earthly events to their appointed
end, and along the way He does not withhold trials and hardship
from his children. He also punishes those who go their own way
—for those who depart from God can expect griefs and sorrows.
History, therefore, is the story of God's guidance of and God's
involvement with humankind; it is the confirmation of the promises
and threats which Revelation has attached to His covenant with
man. To study history, therefore, is for Groen not just a pleasant
pastime that can yield many interesting things. It is an essential
work for a Christian, who should leave no means unused to learn
to know God better. It stands written! It has come to pass! That
is how Groen loved to summarize his Christian-historical world-
view. Notice how Groen's aphorism puts Holy Scripture first, as
God's indisputable proclamation of the truth. But God also reveals
himself in what comes to pass in history, although on that score
human knowledge is limited and imperfect, which is why the book
of history will always have to be read while constantly testing it
against the written Word. What has happened is not good just
because it happened. That was the view, basically, of many of
Groen's contemporaries, the conservatives of the so-called Histor-
ical School. They accepted the existing order as having been real-
ized in the historical process under God's providential rule and
therefore as good. Those conservatives forgot about evil and about
testing history against fixed norms. Thus they were often uncritical
admirers of the status quo and, by the same token, terribly afraid
of the continuation of the historical process. The distinctiveness of
Groen's position was that he wanted to apply the standards of
God's law to the historical process—in which, after all, anti-godly,
diabolical forces are active as well.
In this way Groen in principle freed himself from many dif-
ficulties and took up a special place over against the conservative
worshippers of the status quo as the product of a sacrosanct
historical development. Groen would always be different. Neither
conservatism nor progressivism appealed to him. While he fought
a life-long battle against what passed for progress and renewal, on
the other hand he shocked conservatives more than once by his
surprisingly modern standpoints on all sorts of practical questions.

That he took distance from a conservatistic wish to preserve every-
thing as is, without change, is all the more striking because that
attitude was widespread precisely among his Christian friends. But
neither did he fall into the trap which, then and later, amounted to
a belief in a progressive evolution of human society. Groen held
that those who believed in progress might differ among themselves
about the question whether economic developments alone deter-
mined the course of history or whether people of good will could
exert some influence over it, nevertheless they too arrived at a mis-
reading of historical reality.
Given his view of history, it was inevitable that an engaged
historian like Groen should want to share the results of his journey
into the past with as many people as possible, precisely for the
sake of the present. He wanted to share his findings not just with
fellow professionals who were able to read the Archives, but also
with ordinary people.
And with schoolchildren. "The reading of many schoolbooks
about the history of our country has made me keenly aware of the
need for a kind of Handbook or Overview for use by teachers, to
which should be added a textbook for children," Groen wrote in
May 1841 to his friend and publisher Bodel Nijenhuis. To com-
pose such a work, he realized, would really require many more
years of study; but he would rather have "something reasonable
now than something good ten years from now." What had contrib-
uted to his wish for a good, Christian history textbook was his
disillusionment with Bilderdijk's Geschiedenis des Vaderlands,
which had been published after his death in eleven volumes, based
on the master's lecture notes. After reading in them Groen had to
admit that as an historian he found Bilderdijk very disappointing.
Publishing a handbook
Accordingly, Groen set to work. Before the year 1841 had ended,
the first instalment of his Handbook of the History of the Father-

land rolled off the press. The next instalments cost him more time,
especially the part about the eighteenth century, for which he had
to do pioneering work since no general overview of the period
existed anywhere. As well, he wanted to pay a good deal of
attention to that period in order to show the immediate background
of his own time. In 1846 the Handbook was completed, consisting
of over 1100 numbered paragraphs in a volume just shy of 1100
pages.
The publication of Groen's Handbook is an event of great sig-
nificance. None of his other works has been that influential. It has
been reissued many times, most recently in 1978. Generations of
schoolteachers have relied on it. For many people it was the book
from which they garnered not only their factual knowledge of
history but also a vision, an inspiration for their own lives—as
was true, for example, of Queen Wilhelmina (1880-1963), who
always had a copy of the book within reach.
As he was working on the book Groen hoped of course that it
would be well received. But he was also keenly aware that the
book would be strongly criticised. His version of history, after all,
contradicted many settled opinions. In the Preface of 1846 the
author met some of his critics halfway. They should bear in mind,
he writes, that the settled opinions of our time will not remain
unchanged. They will all have to be revisited, thanks to the flower-
ing of historical science and the opening up of many new sources.
Furthermore, Groen points out, his account is the result of years
of study and is based in large measure on material that still
remains unpublished or has only recently become available. He has
included references to other authors but has guarded against
burying this handbook under an avalanche of scholarly footnotes.
Still, Groen is confident that as more and more sources become
available they will bear out that he has not been guilty of hasty
conclusions or superficial judgments. "I declare with confidence

that perfect impartiality has been my aim."
That was the determined slogan of nineteenth-century scholars
who wanted to know what the past had really been like, who
wanted to weigh and measure connections and relationships in a
strictly logical manner approaching as it were mathematical cer-
tainty. They would record the facts, nothing but the objective facts,
derived from sources whose authenticity and worth had been
scientifically established. Their aim was to write history as a
clinical science, stripped of all bias, emotion, prejudice and
superstition. Hence their predilection for editing and publishing
historical sources and reconstructing events with the utmost
accuracy. The Netherlands produced some great historians in the
nineteenth century: There was Robert Fruin, who became the first
professor of history in Leyden; then there was Reinier Bakhuizen
van den Brink, the later national archivist; and there were also
many other archival researchers and writers of learned and
readable historical essays. Does this mean that the Preface to the
Handbook shows that Groen adhered to the nineteenth-century
belief in positivistic objectivity? Does he not state there, after all,
that "perfect impartiality" had been his aim? To forestall all
misunderstanding, Groen added a couple of paragraphs to that
declaration. If by impartiality is understood the skilful setting aside
of all parties, he will not subscribe to that. "In the interest of na-
tional concord," he writes, "many would like to subject our history
to a cleansing that smoothes over every difference of political, at
any rate religious, viewpoint and passes on only harmless truths."
Groen does not, he writes, want to join in that noble endeavour.
Why not? Because he refuses to let his pen tell lies. He will not,
for the sake of peace, ascribe to ambition or greed what stemmed
from religious motives. He declines to give certain persons a
colour and an influence which they did not have. Above all, Groen
does not want to obscure the fact that "the rise and flowering of
the Netherlands followed upon the confession of the Gospel, its

decline upon the forsaking of the Gospel." Everywhere, he notes
—laying his cards on the table— everywhere I have written as a
Protestant Christian. I may justly be told that throughout the book
I have placed my sentiments, certainly those in the area of religion,
in the foreground.
So, partisan history after all? Precisely for this reason the
critics then and later have always called the Handbook subjective,
biased and unscholarly. Groen anticipates their criticism. I am not
of the opinion, the Preface continues, that denying or disguising
one's principles is a condition or a guarantee of laudable or desir-
able impartiality. But have no fear: I have not made History over
into evidence for my Religious conviction. I have not allowed my
account to become one-sided or lacking in nuance, nor have I made
connections where there are none. That is not to say, however, that
the highest truths that obtain have to be put aside in a scholarly
work. It is not permitted mortal man to lift the veil which God has
spread over the mysteries of his governance of the world. Yet
neither is the Christian permitted to close his eyes to what God
does allow him to see: that God's love and justice are manifest in
the course of history and that the fortunes of our nation show that
He stands by his promise, "Those that honour Me will I honour."
It is precisely the war for or against the Truth, for or against the
Christ, that is the cohesive element in history, which so often
seems incoherent and aimless. Surely the Christian historian may
not be silent about that? The perfectly objective science that others
pursue does not exist, is an impossible fiction. Only he can be
impartial who belongs to a party.
Not till later generations would people realize the correctness
of Groen van Prinsterer's standpoint, which was diametrically
opposed to the science ideal of the nineteenth century. Of course
he was aware that his philosophical position was not a magic
formula that an historian can apply in his professional activity
without much difficulty. How is one to know, for example, what

is the good and what is the bad in history? And how can one deter-
mine what effect this or that had in the long run? The danger is
very real to attribute all kinds of events to direct divine inter-
vention and so hide one's ignorance under apparently pious con-
clusions. How easily events then turn into miracles—a common
enough occurrence in older Christian history-writing! Groen had
little sympathy for this. "In the history of our country the course
of God's Providence is manifest enough to be able to dispense with
such wondrous deeds," he informed his Revell friend Koenen who
had inquired why Groen had omitted any mention in the Handbook
of the double ebb-tide of 1672 which presumably had prevented
the English from invading the country from the sea. Even with the
omission of such matters, Groen's Handbook could easily be rec-
ognized as a Christian history book. Both the plan and especially
the vision of the Handbook give it a very distinctive character.
Written in Groen's compact, aphoristic style, and astonishingly
rich in detail, it betrays great mastery of historical knowledge as
well as literary talent.
It goes without saying that the Handbook also had its short-
comings. One person cannot know everything, nor always judge
correctly. After more than a century and a half of ongoing
research, certain objections can be raised against it. That has often
been done, then and later—which is simply indicative of the
significance of the Handbook of the History of the Fatherland.
Lectures on unbelief and revolution

Thus Groen's work in the Royal Archives was producing rich
results. A series of source publications and a comprehensive hand-
book offered substantial contributions to the renewal of Dutch
historiography, contributions that were now within reach of those
who studied and who taught history. And yet, Groen felt that
something was still missing. He became more conscious of this
during the summer of 1845, when he was composing the final

instalment of the Handbook, the one that had to deal with the
period after 1795. It was a difficult task. Describing one's own
time always puts restrictions on an historian. That was very true
for Groen. After all, he had become more and more convinced that
the history of the nineteenth century was governed by the ideas
which had been put into practice during the French Revolution.
However, an extensive treatment of those ideas, or of the Revo-
lution itself, did not fit the design of the Handbook. Yet such a
discussion was essential for a proper understanding of contempo-
rary times. Accordingly, Groen decided to devote a separate study
to the Revolution, to supplement the Handbook as it were, and
further clarify it. At the same time this would give him an oppor-
tunity to set forth on a scholarly level what had ripened, not least
through historical studies, into his full-grown, mature worldview.
To carry out his plan, Groen chose a somewhat unusual
method. He invited a number of friends, kindred spirits and other-
minded men, to come and listen to him lecture in his library on
Saturday evening, November 8, 1845, at his home on the Korte
Vijverberg in The Hague. Fifteen of such evening lectures were
given by him during the winter of 1845-46. That method had the
advantage that he could organize chapter by chapter as the winter
progressed and respond to any comments by his audience from
which he could profit or to which he could respond the next time
they met. This history of its origin explains in part the difficult
composition of Unbelief and Revolution (this was the title under
which the lectures were afterwards published). As well, the select
nature of his invited audience gave Groen permission to make
things difficult. He could be lavish with his quotations, in several
foreign languages, or refer to well-known and lesser known writers
and books of the time. He was also free to make allusions to events
and affairs that his educated listeners would be familiar with.
Another reason why Unbelief and Revolution is not Groen's

easiest work lies in the nature of the subject. Unbelief and Revol-
ution is at once an historical study and a theoretical, philosophical
treatise. The sum of his political views as expounded in Unbelief
and Revolution—here for the first time to its fullest extent—was
referred to by Groen himself as a "Christian-historical worldview."
It would be correct to say that Unbelief and Revolution is the
indispensable key to understanding Groen's thought and action—
in state and politics, in the area of learning and scholarship, and in
the church.
An anti revolutionary worldview

-
The principal ideas of Groen's Christian-historical (also called

anti-revolutionary) conception can be summarized as follows.
There is a direct link between unbelief and Revolution. One might
even say that unbelief is the Revolution and the Revolution is
unbelief. For by Revolution Groen does not understand events like
violent political and social upheavals that are covered in school-
books and receive headlines in newspapers. Nor does "Revolution"
in Groen's usage refer to the events that took place in France in
1789 and following. That mistake is often made, but for Groen
that sort of happening can be at most an attendant phenomenon or
an external manifestation of the Revolution. Revolution is for
Groen the "inversion of the general spirit and mode of thinking" of
people who draw up and carry out their plans while thrusting aside
the Word of God. The arrogance of elevating man to be the law
and norm of all things arises from unbelief, when people refuse to
bow before the laws and commandments of God and disbelieve His
promises of blessing and judgment. Revolution is rooted in apos-
tasy, when people revolt against God and turn their backs on Him,
spurred on by unbelief.
The revolt against God, however, leads necessarily and irrev-
ocably to a revolt against one's fellow-man. After all, humans
have a natural tendency not only to hate God but also to hate their
neighbour, yes even to hate themselves. Whoever refuses to live by
the wise precepts that God has given for the life of man, including
his everyday life in state and society, will go on to create rules of
conduct that are in conflict with the will of the all-wise Creator.
And when the resulting Revolutionary ideas gain sufficient
adherence and begin to control people, they will want to apply
them and live by them. Then Revolutionary thoughts give birth to
Revolutionary deeds, and the pressure to continue on the road once
taken—the urge to persist in the evil—leads to ever more radical
consequences, even "to the most excessive absurdities and the
worst atrocities." No moderation, no self-restraint, no reason-
ableness is to be expected: griefs and sorrows await those who
have forsaken God.
Of course there will be people who, alarmed by the mounting
violence of the unfolding Revolution, declare the worst atrocities
to be exaggerations. They are the conservatives, the people of the
golden mean or middle-of-the-road who advocate moderation and
reasonableness. However, they fall prey to doubt about what to do
and what not to do, defenceless as they are over against the
doctrinaires who hold to the same principles but who call for their
unrestricted application. Has the course of history not shown this
to be the case time after time? The moderates had no adequate
rejoinder against the philosophers who in their writings preached
Revolutionary notions like liberty and equality, popular sover-
eignty and government by consent. Accordingly, they had no
defence against a revolution that demanded political reform on the
basis of these notions, as in France in 1789. And once the Jacobins
there demanded a radical implementation of equality and frater-
nity, the conservative Girondins could register no fundamental
objections; they fell under the guillotine, victims of the inconsis-
tency for which they were blamed on the basis of their own
theories. And how much violence and terror did Robespierre
subsequently not exercise in the name of liberty and equality?

Does not sincere belief—even Revolutionary unbelief—demand a
full measure of devotion, utter submission, and a complete appli-
cation? That is why the consequences of the Revolutionary notions
cannot be combatted with any success, Groen warned, unless we
break away at all points from the influence of those notions. Only
the Gospel avails against the Revolution. Only the anti-revolu-
tionary man, the man who thinks within a Christian-historical in-
stead of a Revolutionary framework, can hope to stand his ground.
These are the basic premises that Groen elaborated in his lec-
tures on Unbelief and Revolution. At bottom, the revolution in
France was not the result of the political and social conditions
existing in that country before 1789, even though, to be sure, some
abuses had crept in. Nor can that revolution be explained from
ideas like royal absolutism that men believed in during the ancien
regime. Nor yet from the Reformation! Indeed, in the view of
many liberal Protestants and conservative Catholics in the nine-
teenth century, that was precisely the case: the French Revolution
was supposed to have been the logical consequence of the Refor-
mation of the sixteenth century. The Reformation, they reasoned,
had also emphasized personal responsibility and liberty; it had
broken the supernatural powers of prince and priest. And was the
Calvinist form of church government not the triumph of
demo-cray?AnthPsidealofrtnbwchuad
state, was it not the forerunner of the separation of Church and
State as accomplished during the Revolution? Groen refuted the*
notions. According to the Reformation, the church is not governed
by the people: it is governed by the obedience of all the people to
the Word of God. The distinction between temporal and spiritual
authority differs essentially from the separation of church and state
as propagated by liberalism. Those who support such a separation
give the state permission to break away entirely from the authority
of divine law. Such a state may even try to lord it over the church!
The latter is actually the case in the Netherlands, Groen reminded

his audience, for the new, government-imposed administrative
reorganization of 1816 continues to hamper the church, and
Christian parents are not free to educate their children in non-
government schools.
In the central lectures of his series Groen explains that it is the
Revolutionary theories—the modern theories about religion and
politics as worked out during the eighteenth century—that are
responsible for the Revolutionary eruptions of his time. At the core
of that Revolutionary way of thinking is unbelief, the belief that
puts man on God's throne and declares human reason sovereign.
Reason is made the touchstone of everything else, even of faith.
But once the Truth has degenerated into Reasonable Christianity,
the only natural consequence can be the rise of deism and atheism,
which dismiss God from practice as well as theory. However, what
happens to morality, which preserves man and society? Morality
degenerates into enlightened self-interest and dissolves when
deprived of any basis or norm. Without Christ one lives without
hope in the world. Freedom of thought demands freedom of action.
Yet everywhere in our society men bump up against hindrances to
that liberty, restrictions that were instituted to curb evil. Away
with all those bonds and those obstructions, cries the Revolu-
tionist; they are the cause of the evils in society! All kinds of con-
ditions and structures have distorted man, who is by nature good,
and have curbed his freedom, harmed his disposition, degraded his
behaviour. Away with authority! Away with differences in rank,
class, wealth, position! Long live Liberty, Equality, Fraternity!
This is the basis on which we will erect a new society. No longer
will society be based on divine creation ordinances, but people will
associate into a political community on the basis of a social
contract. A new kind of state will be set up, one in which popular
sovereignty demands the political equality of all citizens and in
which the authorities are subject to the will of the people.
Given these theories, Groen argues, one need not be surprised

at the practical results. The 18th-century thinker Montesquieu,
who believed he had found the recipe for a harmonious form of
government without defects by advocating a complete separation
of legislative, executive and judicial powers, looks like a respec-
table man to every respectable liberal. But are Montesquieu's
ideas, apart from being much less consistent, that much different
from those of Rousseau, who is generally accused of radicalism
and of being the spiritual father of totalitarian men of practice? Is
not the entire history of the French Revolution and its aftermath,
right up to the present, undeniable proof of the thesis that unbelief
gives birth to Revolutionary thoughts and that Revolutionary
thoughts lead to Revolutionary deeds?
After this philosophical analysis of the nature of the Revolu-
tionary ideology, Groen resumed his historical overview in the last
five chapters of Unbelief and Revolution. History would prove
that his basic theses were correct, precisely because those theses
had proved themselves in history. And so at this point in the lec-
tures the Christian philosopher rejoined the Christian historian.
A mechanical idealism?
Many commentators have protested against the natural and neces-
sary link that Groen posited between unbelieving thought and rev-
olutionary action. The link, critics have alleged, is one-sided and
more the dogmatic statement of a believer than the explanation of
an historian. Groen supposedly adhered to a kind of "mechanical
idealism," one that he no doubt had learned from Plato (witness his
dissertation!), the Plato who had such a powerful appeal to so
many conservative aristocratic intellectuals, causing them to lose
sight of social, economic and political realities.
An extensive investigation of Groen's relation to the Greek
philosopher, published by Dr. Johan Zwaan in 1972, has clearly
shown that Plato's influence on Groen van Prinsterer has always
been grossly overrated. A close reading of Groen's historical

writings, as well as of his introduction to the Handbook, shows
that Groen certainly appreciated many kinds of causes and effects.
He did indeed recognize a necessary connection between unbelief
and Revolution, but not as a kind of mechanical idealism but as the
nexus that flows from the fact that the God of history is the God
of the Covenant with man, Who carries out the promises and
threats of that Covenant in the course of history.
Groen had the text of his fifteen Saturday evening lectures
printed pretty well unchanged. Originally he had not planned to do
this, preferring to revise them carefully and put the finishing
touches to them. But developments in the Netherlands and beyond
would not allow him, as he put it, to polish and perfect his
weapons. It was time to start using them.
Chapter 3
Battling the Spirit of the Age
The fifteen years between 1833 and 1848 were not just spent on
1 historical research and theoretical essays on anti-revolutionary
ideas about state and society. Groen also tried to realize his
insights through practical activities. Those activities were aimed
at three key issues for a Christian politician: the relation between
church and state, education, and the church itself.
Once the light of the gospel of the crucified and risen Christ
had begun to shine for Groen, he was not ashamed to witness to it.
His correspondence and publications are evidence of this. As will
be expected, the Greens closely followed church events at home
and abroad. There were currents in the Revell, admittedly, which
in an individualistic and introvert fashion distanced themselves
from the organized church. Church leaders, however, did not like
the awakenings. The Continental Awakening seldom escaped
running into conflict with the leadership of the churches. As a
result of one such conflict, for example, the adherents of the Revell
in Switzerland ended up outside the official church, and something
similar happened in Scotland with the Disruption of 1843 and the
formation of the Free Kirk. Yet not everyone had an anti-establish-
ment sentiment. Friends of the Dutch Revell rejoiced at every sign
of spiritual revival, so they paid close attention to the struggle in
the Dutch Reformed Church which in 1834 led to a Secession.
Groen and the Secession of 1834

Groen van Prinsterer's first impressions of the actions of Rev.
Hendrik de Cock of the northern village of Ulrum were not very
Battling the Spirit of the Age 49
favourable. At least, in January of 1834 he wrote to Willem de

Clercq that the booklets published by De Cock—one about the
Synod of Dordt and another about the "true Reformed doctrine"
—showed "more zeal than ability." Actually, Groen did not pass
this judgment on the basis of his own reading. Half a year later he
had made up for this omission but he still did not know what to
make of De Cock and the cause he represented. True, he did not
hesitate to predict that the recent dismissal of De Cock by the
church authorities would undoubtedly have weighty consequences.
But he saw no reason for a general secession from the Reformed
Church according to the example that threatened to take place in
Ulrum: "Separation cannot take place," he wrote, "on the mere
grounds of the defrocking of a minister, even if one is convinced
that the defrocking was completely unjust. One does not leave the
church because of a wrong decision made by a church board." Nor
did Groen believe that a secession could be justified by the claim
that most ministers failed to preach the pure gospel. Must those
who remain loyal to the foundations of the Reformed Church
abandon the field to those who want to start a new-modish church
denomination? If people cannot live together in the same house-
Groen's line of reasoning here clearly reflects his background as
a lawyer—then an inquiry must be made to determine to whom the
house rightfully belongs: who should leave and who should stay.
To secede of one's own volition is a foolish sacrifice of one's
rights and leaves the adversary an easy master of the field.
Not that Groen condemned each and every secession. On the
contrary, he was sincerely convinced that the recent separation in
Switzerland, for example, had only been right. But he deemed the
situation in the Dutch church to be different. When a couple of
months later, in October 1834, the news reached him that the
Ulrum congregation had officially seceded, his standpoint re-
mained unchanged: it was a most ill-advised step, one that could
have many harmful consequences.
Those harmful consequences were not long in coming, at least

not for the Seceders. They were persecuted and oppressed: they
were subjected to billeting of troops, disruption of their meetings,
fines and prison terms. This policy of persecution was based to a
considerable degree on a number of clauses stemming from the
Penal Code of Napoleonic days which prohibited meetings of more
than 20 persons without a permit. Existing and registered church
denominations were exempt from this stipulation, but the sting lay
in the terms "existing and registered." The Seceders, who claimed
that they were "returning" to the old Reformed religion and to the
old church order and church formularies, refused to register with
the authorities as a new church body. It was not they who were
forming a new church; that was done by the church polity imposed
in 1816, which had created a new denomination—the "Reformed
Society," as the Seceders called it!
In defence of the Seceders

Groen closely followed the court proceedings against the Seceders.
He personally attended the hearings in The Hague that dealt with
the appeal that Rev. Hendrik Pieter Scholte had filed against sev-
eral convictions. Groen could only agree with the defence attorneys
for the Seceders that ecclesiastical assemblies in no way fell within
the articles in the Penal Code. Those articles were intended for
political gatherings; they did not hold for worship services. If they
did, there would be no point to the article in the Constitution that
guaranteed freedom of religion. For how could citizens enjoy free-
dom of religion without freedom of worship?
After ample deliberation Groen decided that he could no longer
in good conscience remain silent about the persecution of the
Seceders. Being a former secretary of the royal cabinet and the
current royal archivist, he had to get over any scruples he may
have felt about publicly opposing a government policy. But in
March 1837 he submitted a Memorandum to the King in which he
subjected the government measures against the Seceders to a kind

of judicial review. He received a confirmation of receipt but after
some months had to conclude that evidently it had had no effect
and was being held up in the ministry's office. Thereupon he
revised the Memorandum and had it published under the title, The
Measures Against the Seceders Tested Against Constitutional
Law.
The 72-page tract saw two reprints that same year. In it, Groen
did not declare hiinself in favour of the Secession. He still believed
it was wrong. Nor had his opinion of De Cock improved and in
general he acknowledged many faults and foibles in the conduct of
the Seceders. As for their writings, for example in the monthly De
Reformatie, they "commend themselves neither in content nor in
tone." But, said Groen, if we value justice it must be justice for all,
without respect of persons.
Groen then moved on to a discussion of the Seceders' cause, in
three stages. First he exposed the causes of unrest in the Reformed
Church, next the manner in which a movement for secession had
developed in that situation of unrest, to end by expounding the
incorrectness of the prosecutions from a political and especially
legal standpoint. The separation of church and state in the French
Period, he began, had not produced what was logically expected
from it. The government's enactment in 1816 of a polity for the
Reformed Church brought about a wholly new situation, in fact
created an entirely new church denomination that was administered
by a Synod appointed by the Crown and subject to perpetual
supervision by the Government. For all intents and purposes it was
the Ministry of Reformed Worship that settled all questions in the
church. If, Groen continued, the foundation of the Reformed
Church in the Netherlands was thus altered in terms of its
governance, it was also altered in terms of its doctrinal stance. By
means of a subtle change in wording in the Form of Subscription
for office-bearers, the time-honoured confessional standards were
put in jeopardy. In signing the form, ministers now declared in

effect that they subscribed to "the doctrine of the Reformed
Church" insofar as these agreed with the Word of God, rather than
inasmuch as. Each person could now determine on his own what
interpretation he would want to give to "the doctrine of the
Reformed Church." The upshot of this change, which in effect
legitimated a form of doctrinal freedom, was not long in coming.
All sorts of erroneous teachings became current; for example, it
allowed the spread of the Groningen School, which believed it had
found a "creed for our time" by taking distance from Calvin and
Dordt and assimilating faith and science. Yet those who today
oppose all these developments, Groen writes, are denounced as
obscurantists, hopelessly out of step with the times, ungrateful
disturbers of the peace. In this turn of events, the passivity with
which people had learned to bow to state authority came home to
roost. The very thing which under Napoleon was called the iron-
fisted measure of a tyrant—placing everything under the tutelage
of the state— was regarded in 1816 as a beneficent act of paternal
care by the gentler hand of a repatriated member of the national
dynasty of Orange. Men failed to realize that while persons had
changed the system remained unchanged. And the universal desire
for peace did the rest: "no parties in the land!" had been the
slogan.
Meanwhile, the tract continues, a religious revival has arisen
which once again cherishes truths long held cheap. People demand
the full and unabridged truth of the Bible again. To determine what
that is, of course, they look to the Forms of Unity which are
recognized by the church itself as expressing its creedal stance. It
is the struggle for upholding these Forms that has opened people's
eyes to the power in the church of the Synod and the State—
authorities which have turned out, moreover, to sanction the
watering down and mutilation of the gospel.
Groen does not want to deny that mistakes have been made in
that struggle. As in any quarrel, parties have been guilty of exag-
gerated statements. But what should not be ignored is that the
concerned members have only requested what in fact they have a
right to demand: namely, that the church in accordance with its
own confessions be a truly evangelical church. The result of their
request for restoration has been entirely negative: neither the
Synod nor the Government has seen fit to introduce any improve-
ments—thereby in fact creating more room for the evil that has
crept in. Some people have now exhausted their patience. There
are congregations in which for many years nothing but a so-called
gospel has been preached that is stripped of the heart and core of
the Biblical message. Are those people supposed to keep hoping
that things will improve someday, in some near or distant future?
The need of truth for the soul is a need that must be filled daily.
The hungry gain little from the prospect that they will get bread in
a few weeks perhaps.
Such is the long-standing cause of the Secession, maintains
Groen. The events of 1834 involving Rev. de Cock in Ulrum and
Rev. Scholte in Genderen merely happened to be the occasion for
a separation. The Secession has led to all kinds of mistakes, on
both sides. The Seceders may rightly be reproached for having
made such an issue out of a secondary question like the singing of
hymns instead of only psalms. They can be reproached for exag-
gerated zeal, for being overly suspicious of many ministers, for
much narrow-mindedness and many misguided notions. But the
issue is not, Groen emphasizes, whether the actions of this or that
individual have been altogether correct. What counts is not how
the Secession started, but what its starting point is. And that start-
ing point is abundantly clear: the need, the desire for truth—a
justified desire which was not being filled in certain congregations.
The Seceders acted; today, in 1837, their right of assembly is
being disputed and they are prosecuted. However, their prosecu-
tion must be judged inadequate and ineffective: compulsion only

makes people bitter; it does not convince them. Moreover, it is
harmful; it stirs up feelings of resentment toward the government
that inight some day turn into something worse. Above all, it is
unlawful. As residents of the Netherlands the Seceders ought to be
safe from the billeting of troops in their homes, and as members of
the Reformed persuasion they have a right to freedom of worship
and to the protection of the law on the same footing as every other
religious persuasion in the kingdom.
After all this, the tract continued with legal arguments. These
dealt with sections in the Constitution and articles in the Penal
Code relative to the prosecution of the Seceders. Groen rested his
case with the conclusion that these articles were not applicable
here. Therefore Groen requested the Government to grant the
Seceders—not as a new sect but as members par excellence of the
Reformed persuasion and for that very reason seceders—the
protection guaranteed to them by law.
Groen's friends from the Révell were on the whole very pleased
with his gallant defence of the persecuted Seceders, although one
or two of them felt he had written too favourably about them. A
number of non-kindred friends praised his dignified tract as well;
many outside observers simply had a deep aversion to government
coercion in this case and felt embarrassed about the harsh meas-
ures taken against those humble folk. Even in Roman Catholic
circles a few voices were heard that sided with them.
Groen and Thorbecke

Approval here and there could not, of course, compensate for
disapproval elsewhere. Many newspapers gave Groen's publica-
tion the silent treatment. But not Groen's friend from university
days, Johan Rudolf Thorbecke, who in 1830 had still been his
conservative ally in the Belgian affair but who as a law professor
in Leyden was evolving more and more in a direction opposite to
Groen' s. Thorbecke read the Measures Against the Seceders while

on vacation in his beloved province of Gelderland. Still halting be-
tween conservatism and liberalism, Thorbecke disagreed com-
pletely with Groen. He quickly wrote several articles against the
Measures, not because he was all that happy with the govern-
ment's policy but because he thought Groen' s standpoint was even
worse. He thought he detected in it an encouragement to "civil dis-
obedience against a 'godless' state." He also denied that the Con-
stitution prescribed freedom of worship—freedom of religion, yes,
but the state as guardian of the public order surely had the right to
take action against the gatherings of such fanatical people as the
Seceders. In point of fact, by their refusal to apply for official
status as a denomination the Seceders were themselves in contempt
of constitutional state authority.
Thorbecke's sharply worded reaction was very painful for
Groen. Of course Groen was familiar with the personality of his
friend and he knew that their standpoints differed, especially where
their deepest convictions were concerned. Thorbecke too, as a
professor of law, acknowledged Christianity as "the historic centre
and foundation of our discipline"; but his differences with Groen
began the moment that principle had to be applied. For Thorbecke,
the foundation was not the whole edifice: the Christian faith for
him was a strictly private affair and the Bible was not a direct
source of knowledge for political, social and scholarly life. Those
areas, he held, were governed by their own laws.
Thorbecke himself once admitted to Groen that he did not like
writing about religious differences—they tended to cloud personal
relationships, he felt. Once his criticism of the Measures was
published he wrote a very cordial letter to Groen in which he stated
that he hoped their personal relationship could be continued on a
good footing. Groen hoped the same. Nevertheless their diverging
ways, so clearly marked by Thorbecke, did cause their relationship
to cool after this. Henceforth their friendship rested on the memory
of former days, and what ties remained were based on recognition

and appreciation of each other's talents.
Holland's two great parliamentarians of the nineteenth century
achieved success in totally different ways. The ideas that were
most dear to Groen were rejected by Thorbecke. Their opposition
in everyday politics revealed that difference sometimes in a
poignant manner. Yet mutual appreciation remained because they
recognized each other's sincerity and throughout life were able to
appeal to each other's loyalty to principle. In 1841, when he
received a complimentary copy of the first instalment of the
Handbook, Thorbecke wrote Groen: "There are many things that
I cannot see with your eyes. In particular, I fear, we will never
agree about your method of approach. I am not of your faith, but
I wish that everybody did as much for theirs as you do for yours.
Our national character would have more vitality." In 1872, when
Thorbecke died and Groen van Prinsterer published their corres-
pondence as a tribute to his great opponent, he affirmed their
difference of faith by noting that in his slogan, 'Against the
Revolution the Gospel,' Thorbecke "never saw anything other, I
fear, than an impractical utterance and an absurd riddle."
A "juridical-confessional" strategy
With the principle of the Secession Groen van Prinsterer heartily
agreed: the need to restore the reign of truth in the church. In his
Measures he defended the Seceders, but not the Secession; he
personally stayed in the Reformed Church. Groen's character,
upbringing and social status created a gulf between him and many
Seceders. In a private letter he did not hesitate to refer to Rev. de
Cock's "ill-mannered effronteries." As a cultured man from aristo-
cratic circles he took offence at the crude language of that pastor
from Ulrum who reviled his opponents as "wolves in sheep's
clothing." Groen would often be shocked by what he called the
Seceders' fanaticism and self-righteousness and their lack of love
and trust—including lack of trust and confidence in him, Groen.

To be distrusted by them, of all people, was hard to take. As the
years went by, Seceders would sometimes level harsh criticism at
Groen for his stance on the church question and the Christian
public school. Once, when Groen registered his objections to a
reader used in a Secessionist primary school, in which children
were introduced to the rules of spelling along with the doctrine of
predestination, he was accused of being only semi-Calvinist and
anti-Secession. Disagreements of this kind did not exactly help
bring them closer together. But these things were not the main
reason why Groen disapproved of the Secession. In contrast to
friction with some, he had cordial relations, for example, with
leaders like Hendrik Pieter Scholte, Antonie Brummelkamp and
Jan van Andel. And in other cases, too, Groen showed that he
appreciated men from among the common people, men whom he
trusted and loved and accepted as valuable co-workers and
brothers. But unlike the Seceders, he had chosen for what came to
be called the "juridical-confessional" model of church reform.
Condemnation of the Secession was widespread among people
of the Revell. Many found even Groen too activist; they chose for
the "medical" model. Their pietist individualism encouraged wait-
ing patiently for what might develop in the way of inner reform of
the church; they undertook no action beyond their own personal
circle. This attitude was also encouraged by an un-Reformed, low
view of the importance of the organized church community. To
some, even Groen's publication of the Measures was already too
much: a Christian ought to accept suffering as a trial sent by God.
Willem de Clercq wondered if the demand for justice—for a
genuine application of freedom of religion—by appealing openly
to guarantees in the Constitution did not betray the operation of
"the leaven of the liberals"! But Groen had no patience with such
inactivity. Characteristically, he spent his lifetime calling Christ-
believers in his country to take united action.
Sometimes Groen would compare the Dutch Reformed Church

to an ailing mother whose recovery may be hoped for and who
must therefore not be abandoned in her deplorable state. More
often he would use the image of a house that a stranger has forced
his way into. Groen wanted to follow the juridical road toward
church reform: the stranger has a rightful claim to not one square
inch of room in the house of the church—an image with which he
sought to convince Christians and non-Christians alike. Is it not
self-evident for the Christian, he asked, that the Bible is the
foundation of the Christian Church? That was also true of the
church of the Reformation in the Low Countries, which in the
course of centuries had laid down that the Three Forms of Unity
—namely, the Belgic Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism, and
the Canons of Dordt—contained a binding summary of the evan-
gelical faith to which everyone had to submit in the interest of the
faith community. If that is the true state of affairs, it is as plain as
day that whoever does not hold to the Bible and the Forms has
thereby placed himself outside the bounds of the church. Whoever
places himself outside the essence and basis of the church can no
longer be considered a member of the church. As a logical conse-
quence of his position such a person ought to be consistent and
withdraw. There is room in the church only for those who profess
the Biblical truth.
Battling for church reform

The above train of thought Groen tried to propagate and elaborate
in a number of actions he spearheaded during 1842 and 1843. In
the year 1841 almost 9 000 members of the Reformed Church had
submitted a petition asking Synod to restore the Church "to its old
and firm foundations by upholding the Forms of Unity, restoring
the old formulation of the Form of Subscription for new ministers,
and revising the Church Order and Rules imposed in 1816 in order
to bring them into harmony with God's Word and the Church
Order of Dordt." Synod had declared the petition inadmissible.

After all, did it not uphold the old doctrine? The petition was
tabled, all the more because the signatories were deemed incom-
petent to judge. It was against these Synodical decisions that
Groen decided in May of 1842 to take action. Together with six
friends—like him, well-known and prominent members of the
Reformed Church—he wrote an Open Letter to the Synod. The
document, which became known as the "Address of the Seven
Gentlemen from The Hague," contained an extensive rebuttal of
Synod's claim that it was upholding the old doctrine.
With many examples the address showed that the doctrine was
not being upheld, was at best only tolerated, while the way had
been cleared for all sorts of heresies. As a follow-up to the address
to the Synod Groen wrote an Address to the Reformed Church in
the Netherlands: all the members of the church throughout the
land had to know what was at stake. Both Addresses made clear
what had moved the petitioners. They were written in a frank and
straightforward style. Many good people thought that things were
not so bad with the church. The Addresses were meant to wake
them up and demonstrate that things were much worse than they
had ever suspected. Groen did not hesitate to call the evil by its
name: he did not want to spare the great men of the Groningen
School merely out of consideration for their respectable person-
ages; at issue were not persons but un-Reformed teachings.
The two Addresses raised a lot of dust. In churches and lecture
halls, in numerous articles and broadsides, Groen and his friends
were denounced as fanatical disturbers of the peace. The second
Address had anticipated this charge by asking: What peace do we
disturb? The sweet peace that tolerates a denial of the saving work
of the Redeemer? "It is not I that have troubled Israel, but you,
because you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and
have followed the Baals."
The little success and the many reproaches reaped by Groen

did not stop him from staying the course. His disappointment did
not persuade him to embrace the standpoint of his friend De
Clercq, who wrote: "We have tugged at the Church for many years
now. She is hardening herself against it. Then let it be church in
our homes and in our hearts." De Clercq was not the only one
among Groen's friends who had declined to sign the Addresses.
Their fear of exposing themselves, their passive wait-and-see
attitude, their aversion to being involved in all that unrest deeply
disappointed Groen. Da Costa even published a brochure in which
he openly opposed Groen's "juridical-confessional" method of
working for church reform. His politically astute friend realized at
once how damaging Da Costa's action was: the opposition could
now play Da Costa off against him. Groen would not want to deny
that there were differences between his juridical-confessional
strategy and Da Costa's medical approach, differences that stem-
med in part from their different appreciation of the role and
function of the Forms of Unity. But was it really necessary, he
complained, that Da Costa publicize those differences precisely at
this moment? In the years to follow Groen would be disappointed
more often in Da Costa and other spiritual kin. He was very con-
scious how much needed doing and how little was the strength of
those who wanted to work together for restoration in church and
society. That is why he always looked for ways to mobilize their
combined strength. He used many means to try and organize
collaborative efforts, because he was convinced that only by
combining forces would public action have any chance of success.
Yet time and again, sometimes after a promising start, he would
discover that collaboration was foundering on differences of
viewpoints—differences about the essence of the church, about the
way in which Christians should be engaged, and so on. This is
clearly illustrated in the history of the famous "meetings" of the
Christian Friends.
The Christian Friends meet

In August 1845, after many letters back and forth, a small group
of Christian leaders from across the country met in Amsterdam for
mutual consultation. Those in attendance exhibited all shades of
the Révil and of the confessional movement in the Reformed
Church; present as well were a number of Seceders. The meetings,
which would convene every half year, dealt with various subjects:
church reform, schooling and education, poor relief, internal re-
lations (not least the relation between Seceders and non-seceders).
Groen's exertions in behalf of these meetings were greater than the
results. The more often they met, the more apparent it became
where each of these Christian Friends stood. Whereas some of
them—next to Groen, especially Rev. Ottho Gerhard Heldring-
called for action in the areas of church and society, others were
governed by individualism and acquiescence. While some were not
afraid of direct and open confrontation, even in the church, others
turned out at bottom to assess the church's condition differently
and to expect healing by other means. Groen was deeply dis-
appointed, for example, in Nicolaas Beets—a man of enormous in-
fluence, a great pulpiteer, and a spokesman for orthodoxy. In
August 1848 a meeting was called to discuss the condition of the
Church. A larger than normal group had been invited: pastors,
elders and other prominent church members. Expectations ran
high. Beets had been invited to chair the meeting but he refused: he
did not want to give support to anything that might "provoke or
hasten" a crisis in the church; the meeting might run out of hand,
as it had been rumoured among "the masses who are for the truth"
that at long last the necessity of secession would be proclaimed.
Beets would have no part of it. The meeting was duly held, it was
not the last of its kind, but the opinions of the Friends diverged
more and more.
The Seceders to a small extent contributed to the eventual
demise of the Christian Friends. The well-known Rev. Antonie
Brummelkamp of Arnhem, one of the moderates among the

Seceders, vented his frustrations in April 1848 in a long letter to
Groen van Prinsterer. Brummelkamp did not disapprove as such
of meetings like those of the Christian Friends; he enjoyed attend-
ing them "for the opportunity at least of encouraging one another."
But what was beginning to trouble him was the atmosphere that
prevailed at the meetings. In the fall of 1847 Groen had invited the
Friends not just to talk about the corruption of the Reformed
Church but to do "whatsoever the hand finds to do" to remedy the
situation. And yet, Brummelkamp complained, nothing was done.
The background of Brummelkamp's complaint is quickly told.
After his unsuccessful Addresses of 1842, Groen had once more
entered the public debate about the church question by means of
a long series of articles published between Feb.1847 and Feb.1848
in the monthly De Vereeniging: Christelijke Stemmen, a journal
that may be considered the organ of the Christian Friends. Once
completed, the series was published in a volume entitled Het Regt
der Hervormde Gezindheid the rights of those of the Reformed
—
persuasion. The rights of the Reformed people, Groen argued,

consisted in the fact that the teachings of the Bible, summarized in
the official Confessions, constituted the basis and hallmark of their
Church. Reformed believers therefore ought to make use of those
rights. They should insist that the Confessions be upheld, albeit not
as a shibboleth, in a literalist sense, but as an expression of the
undoubted Christian faith which a believer heartily accepts and
openly confesses against every description of unbelief. It is the
right, it is the duty of those of the Reformed persuasion to uphold
that confession—in the church; against the state; in education. Let
us then investigate, Groen concluded, whether we cannot make
better use of our rights to prevent the denial of the truth in the
church, to acquire Christian day-school education, to oppose unbe-
lieving science with Christian scholarship in the universities, to
protect the Netherlands against the inroads of Roman Catholicism
and the victory of the Revolution doctrine. — Fine phrases, wrote
Brummelkamp, but they are of no use. Whether I call for secession
and you call for action, the Christian Friends just sit still and do
nothing. And that is beginning to weigh on me. However—his
letter to Groen continued—are you not somewhat to blame your-
self for the inactivity you condemn so strongly? Does Dr. Groen,
the man of historical thinking, not see that by writing against the
Secession and looking for the resurrection of a deceased body he
is acting anti-historically? The early Christians were forced to
abandon the Jewish synagogues, Protestants had to leave the
Church of Rome—is there not a lesson in that? "Granted, such
leave-taking should not be done except in the direst necessity, but
surely you cannot disagree with me that the case of dire necessity
is spelled out in Article 29 of our Belgic Confession."
This defence by Brummelkamp of the standpoint of the Seces-
sion, with its forthright reference to the Reformed confession about
"The Marks of the True Church and Wherein it Differs from the
False Church," was nevertheless written in a charitable tone, to a
brother in Christ. Both sides knew of each other that they did not
share their view of the church. In a long passage in Het Regt der
Hervormde Gezindheid Groen had set forth his opinion of the
Secession one more time. For all his sympathy for the Seceders, he
would not deny that they too had disappointed him. They insisted
on a literalist reading of the Confessions; they overemphasized the
doctrine of predestination; they judged that every true Christian
should choose for Secession; they were internally divided. All this
saddened him. But there was more. He thoroughly disagreed with
them in their appraisal of the situation in the Reformed Church.
While they stated that the teachings of the Confessions no longer
held there, he, Groen, insisted that by rights the Confessions were,
and continued to be, the only basis of the Reformed Church. He
did not even scruple to write that, in his opinion, to abandon the
church unnecessarily was to commit a sin. Nevertheless, Groen
hoped that some day he and those of the Secession would see eye
to eye—and Seceders nurtured the same hope. Thus they did not
let go of each other. The fraternal bond, evident in many ways,
continued to tug at them. "You were not ashamed of us," wrote
one of them, "and although I hold to a different standpoint, I found
in you, amid libel and abuse, a brotherly love that gave off
warmth." These words were addressed to Groen in a letter written
by another Secession minister, Rev. Albertus van Raalte, on the
eve of his departure for America. The letter is a testimony to the
reputation that Groen enjoyed among the lovers of truth through-
out the land.
The schools struggle begins

Groen's reputation among the Christians of the Netherlands was
also based to a considerable degree on his efforts on behalf of
Christian education. The struggle for Christian day-schools con-
stitutes one of the most important episodes not just in the life of
Groen but also in his country's history during the 19th century.
Much attention was paid in the Netherlands to the field of
education. In 1798, Holland was the first country in Europe to
appoint a separate Minister of Public Education. The Enlighten-
ment, with its new view of the natural goodness of man
ti, had led to
heightened interest in education. New methods of ins ction were
developed to turn the school into an institution where a young
person could learn to live in harmony with himself and with nature.
During the French Period the advocates of educational renewal got
the chance to reorganize Dutch education in form and substance.
Until 1795, education had been a matter of private initiative and
lower levels of government. Public education in the schools of
cities, towns and villages was formally subject to supervision by
the church. The Church Order of Dordt required that school-
masters be under the supervision of the local church council. In
this way the Dutch Republic, which gave formal recognition only
to the Reformed Church, had a form of Christian public education.

The Revolution of 1795, however, introduced the separation of
church and state and thus also severed the connection between
church and school. In the circumstances of the time this did not
mean that the public school was no longer Christian: the Education
Act of 1806 spoke explicitly of "instruction in all civic and
Christian virtues." Christianity was still cominonly accepted as the
basis for personal and public morality; morning exercises in the
schools included prayer, and teachers were examined as to their
moral and religious views. However, which Christianity was
meant? Certainly not that of the Synod of Dordt. If anything, the
Revolution in the Netherlands took revenge on the Synod of Dordt
of 1618-19. What people wanted was a common Christianity,
incorporating only those fundamentals that would not be offensive
to anyone. A neutral state could not be expected to ensure that its
government-sponsored educational system should side with any
one church's particular creed or confession. Every citizen of the
Netherlands should be able to attend the public school; the school
was intended to enhance national unity. Thus the intellectual
climate which first gave rise to education laws was that of
moderate rationalism. The times preferred a "Christianity above
sectarian differences"—an attitude that was more in keeping with
the Society for the Common Utility than with the Reformed
confession. Education was to provide instruction to help people
advance in moral and material respects, with gratitude for the
greater enlightenment available in modern times. The goal of edu-
cation was an improved society. Children had to learn to walk the
paths of virtue; they had to be educated to become people who, by
knowledge and example, would learn to avoid evil and do good.
After all, that would ensure them higher hopes of heaven as well
as a better society! The public school teacher was allowed to speak
of Jesus—that is, of Jesus the friend of man, the Great Example:
to follow him would enable a person of good will to become more

and more Godlike.
Predictably, resistance arose on the part of those circles who
professed that Christ was not the virtuous model for men of good
will but the Saviour of people who know themselves to be
conceived and born in sin and inclined toward all evil. They
abhorred the national program to provide "instruction in all civic
and Christian virtues." Seceders were the first to move into action
and establish their own schools. By law, however, those who
wanted to start a school had to obtain local government approval
—which was often withheld. Absence of official approval did not
prevent Seceders from operating schools on the sly, which in turn
contributed to an intensification of court actions against them.
Thus began the schools struggle, a struggle for freedom of edu-
cation, for the Christian character of primary schools.
The schools struggle in nineteenth-century Holland would
escalate in scope and intensity as both theological modernism and
orthodoxy experienced an awakening and grew in their respective
following. The central issues in this intense struggle were of
critical importance: What were the rights of parents? The limits of
government? The relation between faith and science? The nature
of man? The principles of pedagogy? In addition, the struggle
became a key issue of public policy, giving birth to political
parties and providing them with cohesive force.
As early as 1832 Groen wrote a letter to the Minister in which
he pointed out the inherent injustice of the Education Act. He dis-
cussed the matter at greater length in his tract of 1837, Measures
Against the Seceders Tested Against Constitutional Law. There
he recalled that the school, like the church, had been brought under
state supervision. And because the statesmen of the day proceeded
from the incorrect notion that national unity must be sought in
national uniformity, the school had become an institution where a
common" Christianity—a general Christianity for all—had to be
--
taught without reference to Christian doctrines. But a Christianity

that has to satisfy Protestants and Catholics and not ruffle Jewish
sensibilities cannot be anything, Groen maintained, but a Christi-
anity without content, a kind of religion which for that very reason
can never satisfy anybody. Under these rules, the public school
was not based on a common, shared faith, but on shared forms of
unbelief and indifference.
A second train of thought that Groen found fault with was the
notion that, instead of laying religion "at the bottom" of the entire
educational process, the public school could be saved by adding an
hour or so of "religious instruction" to the curriculum. That would
mean that what ought to be the heart and soul of education would
be reduced to a separate subject, one that could be entrusted after
hours to the clergy of the various denominations. Summarizing the
educational issue, Groen wrote: "Freedom of conscience, freedom
of worship, freedom of education are indissolubly linked."
Three years later, in 1840, Groen was elected to the Double
Chamber of parliament which met to prepare a revision of the
Constitution that had become necessary as a result of the breakup
of the United Kingdom with the granting of independence to
Belgium. There too Groen raised the schools issue and delivered
a powerful plea for freedom of education:
Parents who, with or without adequate grounds, are honest-

ly convinced that the character of the instruction in the
existing schools is non-Christian, must not, directly or
indirectly, be prevented from providing for their children
the kind of education which they believe they can justify
before God. That compulsion, to put it bluntly, is intol-
erable and ought to stop.
In the same breath Groen also indicated the moral ground for
freedom of education: children are not the property of the state, but
it is parents who have the obligation to raise them. — Not many

members of the Chamber came to his support; far more said that
they disagreed with his viewpoint. A conservative climate of
opinion was afraid of divisions in the nation and was proud of the
common school.
But not only orthodox Protestants, also Roman Catholics ob-
jected to the state monopoly in education. They had not forgotten
King William's suppressive measures against parish schools and
seminaries in Belgium and they now began to agitate for freedom
of education in the North. King William H, who wanted badly to
start his reign off with symbolic acts of goodwill and with policies
that would distinguish him from his father, installed a Committee
to investigate the complaints about education. Next to three
supporters of the status quo, three opponents were appointed: two
Roman Catholics and, to represent orthodox Protestants, Dr.
Groen van Prinsterer. The blue-ribbon inquiry had only meagre
results. The members were unable to come to any agreement.
Groen did not succeed in gaining support for his vision for free-
dom of education and its solution, the separation of public schools,
as a local option, in accordance with religious persuasion. By
Royal Decree of January 2, 1842, it was laid down that if a local
government refused to approve the establishment of a private
school, an appeal could be made to the provincial authorities. This
possibility still placed educational freedom at the mercy of arbi-
trary decisions. By law provincial authorities could now overturn
a local decision that went against starting a private Christian
school, but they were not obligated to do so in fact. Groen was to
find this out personally the very next year. Together with his
friends Pieter Elout van Soeterwoude and Dirk van Hogendorp he
requested the municipal authorities of The Hague to grant per-
mission to erect a private Christian school. Permission was not
granted. The men next lodged an appeal with the provincial
authorities. When that had no results, they appealed to the Crown.
It was all to no avail. Not until 1849 were they able to open their
school—but that was after the Constitution of 1848 had declared
that "the provision of education is free." To be sure, municipal and
provincial authorities were not always so negative as they were in
The Hague. Across the land, scores of tiny little schools were
founded, by individuals, by associations of parents, by Secession
consistories, by Reformed church boards. Groen was consulted for
many of these ventures, and to many of the needier ones he gave
financial support as well. But the battle had only begun. If any-
thing, opposition to Christian schools and disdain for Christian
education only grew worse as the years went by. The struggle for
Christian schools would figure among the highest stakes in
Groen's coming career as a politician.
Chapter 4
About a Revolution
n 1815 the nations of Europe heaved a sigh of relief as the
I representatives of the great Powers agreed to the Settlement of

Vienna. After a quarter century of revolution and war, people
longed for peace and order. The Revolutionary fever had subsided;
the growing influence of Romanticism once more made a conser-
vative-aristocratic lifestyle look very attractive.
The princes, united in a Holy Alliance, ruled their subject chil-
dren with a firm hand, "as befits Christian fathers," or else left
that to their ministers. The Austrian chancellor Metternich from
time to time called his colleagues together to solve some inter-
national disputes and for the rest saw to it that revolutionary
movements did not gain a foothold anywhere. Religious revivals
gained wide support; one more time faith acquired a grip on the
masses, from high to low.
A ferment of ideas
This conservative idyll, of course, did not remain undisturbed.
Much Romantic enthusiasm ran aground on all kinds of everyday
realities. Slowly but surely industrialization spread, creating new
social classes with new political aspirations. Next to a renewed,
and often deficient, reflection on the value ofthe Christian religion,
unbelief continued to corrode the minds. Many people, especially
among the ruling and intellectual classes as well as among the new
middle class, remained loyal to Rationalism. Deism gained ground,
and Higher Criticism of the Bible undermined the faith of many a
About a Revolution 71
university student. The brazen practices of divine-right absolute

monarchs, who refused to allow their subjects a voice in govern-
ment, evoked resistance and fanned the flames of liberalism. Allied
with nationalists, liberals instigated an opposition movement which
at any moment could rise up and demand its rights. Here and there
this was already being tried by radicals who in their efforts for
greater justice in social relations attacked the predominant mood
which acquiesced in existing class structures.
In 1830 an eruption of liberal and national opposition to the
status quo was not very successful. The United Kingdom of the
Netherlands was torn apart, to be sure, and in Paris the reactionary
Charles X, king of France, was replaced by his grand-nephew
Louis Philippe, who was presumed to be more in tune with the
spirit of the new age and was named "king of the French." Louis-
Philippe humbly called himself "citizen-king." But as soon as the
moment was ripe he granted his fellow Frenchmen little freedom
other than to obey his personal, autocratic regime.
A year of revolutions
The year 1848, it seemed, would bring the great reversal. It looked
as if radical liberals and militant nationalists, in a few places also
social radicals, would in a single assault overthrow old Europe.
Once again it began in France, spread to Italy and across the
Habsburg Empire in Central Europe, to mushroom everywhere in
Germany England witnessed the radical campaigns of the Chartist
movement. Ominous rumblings were heard in Holland. The days
of the great Revolutions of 1789 and 1792 were back!
People could not know in 1848 that within two or three years
everything would be over and liberalism, nationalism and social-
ism would be defeated one last time by the forces of conservatism.
As it was, however, this restoration amounted to no more than a
Pyrrhic victory, for the olden days and former relations did not
really return. After 1848, conservatives realized they needed the
support of the masses and they embarked on a fling with national-

ism and the working classes. Liberals realized they could better
gain power by means of the ballot box. Even socialists chose for
that strategy, though not till after the debacle of the Paris Com-
mune in 1871.
In 1848 things were also stirring in the Netherlands.
Inflammatory pamphlets and posters calling for mass demonstra-
tions began to appear in the heart of Amsterdam. Here and there,
minor manifestations were held. None of it was very serious, it
was concluded afterwards. There was indeed a social problem, but
no well-defined working class that could make an issue out of it.
Nor were there any rebellious nationalists, unless one had to put
that label on Roman Catholics who still had to be content with a
kind of second-class citizenship. The group that had the best
chance of gaining power was the liberal bourgeoisie. These people
enjoyed little if any influence, thanks to the authoritarian power of
the King and a franchise that favoured the land-owning nobility.
At the same time, these middle classes were not entirely without
input: they had a not inconsiderable and growing share in the
national sources of economic wealth. They also formed the
intellectual leadership. Their self-confidence and their faith in pro-
gress, social, economic and moral, helped the Netherlands to
overcome its identity crisis after the loss of Belgium and its reduc-
tion to a third-rate power. It was the middle classes who gave the
Dutch a new faith in their future. Taking as their model the flower-
ing of Dutch culture during the Golden Age of the 17 th century,
they attacked the mood of smug complacency and lazy lethargy.
Not only did they send John Stick-in-the-mud into retirement, they
agitated for renewal and modernization—political, social and relig-
ious. They judged that the old-time religions on the model of Dordt
or Trent had had their day. The old political ideas they wished to
replace with new forms of freedom and equality. They desired the
removal of obstacles that frustrated the free individual in his per-
sonal development. The day of freedom was at hand! Freedom of

religion, of occupation, of expression, of assembly, of education.
A franchise which, though not universal, would give the vote to all
respectable folk. And, of course, a form of government which
through ministerial responsibility to Parliament would place real
power in the hands of the people.
A royal coup d'etat

Thanks to an extraordinary set of circumstances, Dutch liberals
got their way in 1848. What played into their hands was the revo-
lutionary turmoil elsewhere in Europe, the King's worries about
his health and his throne, and the absence of any strong conser-
vative advisers. On his own, the King cut the Gordian knot: twice
during his lifetime he had been evicted from the country (in 1795,
as the heir apparent, from the Dutch Republic; in 1830, as crown
prince, from Belgium); he would avoid a repeat, at whatever price.
And that is how the Netherlands got its own liberal revolution—at
the king's initiative, without violence, and with lasting results.
The mere threat of violence, observed Groen van Prinsterer,
had been enough to persuade everyone to give in to the revolu-
tionary demands. At bottom, the 1848 revision of the Constitution
was a coup d'état, for Groen refused to believe that the political
revolution had been desired by the people as a whole. To be sure,
there had been manifestations and demonstrations, but to him these
proved only "that in any sizable town, including The Hague, it is
possible to organize a parade and stage street riots by means of
pamphlets, banners, torches, lots of liquor and a little money." The
authorities, judged Groen, had reacted in panic; the radicals made
clever use of it and the conservative government caved in, thinking
that concessions alone could save the country.
Groen's analysis was hard-hitting, but historians today almost
literally agree with him. Events followed one another quickly. On
13 March 1848, King William II announced that in 24 hours he
had changed from a conservative into a liberal. Whereupon he

appointed a radical committee for drafting a revision of the Con-
stitution. This was the magic charm by which he responded to the
revolution. Thorbecke rewrote the Constitution and well-known
progressives like Donker Curtius, Luzac, and De Kempenaer were
made cabinet ministers. In that company the new minister of
foreign affairs, Count Schimmelpenninck, was rather out of place:
he was more of a liberal in the English sense of the word. His
position among his colleagues was rather shaky and after a few
months he disappeared from the scene.
Stranger than Schimmelpenninck's presence in the cabinet was
Thorbecke's absence from it. Thorbecke had been the intellectual
leader of the radical liberals for a long time already. For many
years he had taught classes in the law faculty of Leyden that had
one overriding theme: the Constitution must be revised! In 1840 he
had published a Proposed Revision that incorporated typically
liberal demands. Still more overtly liberal had been his essay of
1844, On Modern Citizenship, in which he referred to universal
suffrage as an expression of the evolution of society which in the
long run was inevitable and just. In that same year 1844 he had
demonstrated his leadership of the liberal phalanx with the sub-
mission in Parliament of the "Proposal of the Nine." On that
occasion the nine members were outvoted by a large majority who
rejected their proposal for constitutional reform and a census-
based franchise. Now, however, in 1848, Thorbecke was the man
who drafted the Constitution. But when the new ministry had to
formed, Thorbecke was bypassed. Thus he was not allowed to
defend the new constitution in Parliament, nor translate its pro-
visions into concrete legislation. At least, not for the time being.
After a year it became apparent that the country could not do
without him. In 1849, Thorbecke was called back, to become the
head of his first Ministry.
The spirit of the revolution

What was Groen doing in 1848? Naturally, he followed events in
France and Europe with great interest. "We are again, it would
seem, entering upon dark times," he noted in February after the
first news about the Paris revolution had reached The Hague. "But
there is no profit," he wrote three weeks later to his dejected friend
Koenen, "in nursing despondency and grave misgivings about the
eventualities of a dim future. We must show that there is peace and
hope for the Christian, even as the world is sunk in a mood of
despair." Shortly after, he inquired matter-of-factly of his pub-
lisher whether it would not be appropriate to advertise again that
there were still copies available of two of his books, Contribution
to a Revision of the Constitution and Unbelief and Revolution.
A reference to Unbelief and Revolution, however, was not
Groen's only contribution to combatting the revolution which he
had foretold in that book. As the storms of revolution raged
—there were riots in the streets of The Hague, even close to his
home- Groen sat down and wrote a series of pamphlets under the
collective title Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: Explanation of the
Slogan of the Revolution. The series of five appeared between
April and June of 1848. It was a condensed and popularized
version of Unbelief and Revolution, a book that was too difficult
for the broader public. "Very well," Groen began, "the revolution-
aries promise freedom, equality and brotherhood. Wonderful
things! But what does the slogan really entail? Just look at the
earlier revolutions that raised the slogan." With rapid strokes of a
razor-sharp scalpel, frequently dipped in irony, Groen analyzed the
slogan and its background: man without God, trying to build a
better world without the liberating insights of God's Word. One
can be sympathetic, he wrote, to many of the radicals' demands,
if stripped of their revolutionary rhetoric. But can a bad tree bring
forth good fruit? Theories born of unbelief surely cannot be the
solid principles on which to base a genuine revision of the coun-
try's public framework. Only in faithful obedience to the Word of

God can true freedom be found, including freedom and well-being
for state and society.
On November 3, 1848 the new Constitution was proclaimed
throughout the land. There was a big celebration in The Hague.
Church bells were ringing and special illumination lit up the public
squares. Walking past the Palace, passers-by were greeted by a
large banner that read: "GOD IS WITH THE NETHERLANDS." Groen
wrote to his publisher in sombre tones, though not without a touch
of humour: "As I assess the condition of the country I must say
that the whole makes more of an impression on me of a funeral
than of a celebration."
Groen's low spirits are understandable. Sure, he was thankful
that his country in many respects had been spared disaster amid
the tumult of the nations. The revision of the Constitution fortu-
nately had been completed without fatal clashes. But of course it
was too early to tell whether the country was now out of danger.
And if the principles which he believed had spawned the revised
Constitution would ever gain the upper hand, then the country in
his view was moving further on the path of Revolution and was
one step closer to the abyss. That was the appraisal with which
Groen opened his nine essays on Constitutional Revision and
National Concord, written between November 1848 and October
1849. Here he analyzed the background to the events of 1848 and
carefully expounded his own viewpoints.
Groen was not opposed to a constitutional revision as such. "I
was not unconditionally enamoured of the old situation. I deplored
the fact that the revision of 1840 was inadequate and insignificant.
I declaimed against every arbitrary tendency or deliberate leaning
toward a kind of Revolutionary Autocracy, which would be fatal
for King and Nation alike. After the plain meaning of the Consti-
tution had been obscured by bigoted officials and arbitrary judges,
I had hoped for a better and more effective guarantee of freedom
of religion and education. Always I pressed for Cabinet unity and

Ministerial responsibility, for the possibility of dissolving the
lower house, for public sessions of the upper house, and for
expanding the nation's voice in electing its representatives." In the
language of today: Groen was in favour of constitutional guaran-
tees of civil and political liberties, and a cabinet system of govern-
ment with popular participation based on a generous franchise.
Those were in fact the great changes achieved by the Con-
stitution of 1848. To prove that he had always been in favour of
those changes Groen was able to point to many publications: his
popular book of 1848, Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap, his
Open Letter to Count Schimmelpenninck about freedom of edu-
cation, his Rights of the Reformed Persuasion of 1847 and The
Measures Against the Seceders of 1837. Last but not least, he was
able to point to his activities at the time of the previous consti-
tutional revision, in 1840, when as an elected representative he had
expressed himself unequivocally on all these points and later that
year had published his views in his Contribution to a Revision of
the Constitution in a Netherlandic Spirit. In 1840 he had demand-
ed freedom of the press, freedom of worship, freedom of educa-
tion, and parliamentary supervision of colonial policy. He had
advocated restricting authoritarian royal power by public scrutiny
of public finances, by an independent role for the Council of State,
by decentralization of administration and recognition of the power
of the Provincial Legislatures. He had declared himself to be an
opponent of the practice under King William I that the ministers
were mere instruments of the King, "senior clerks, agents who car-
ried out every one of the King's orders without having a mind of
their own." Ministers ought to be responsible for their own depart-
ments. In the place of royal autocracy Groen would even have
preferred, if need be, full political responsibility for ministers,
expressed in their duty to counter-sign every royal decree and
every legislative bill. He had argued in favour of abolishing the
upper house; he saw no need for a body that sought its right of
existence in rubber-stamping the will of the King. He had demand-
ed a truly independent posture of the lower house: untrammelled
use of its power to initiate bills, to amend and vote on budgets, to
debate policy. He had called for an extension of the franchise and
for a strengthening of the bond between electors and elected.
Principle against principle

Thus, in 1848 much of what Groen had deemed desirable had been
achieved. And that filled him with satisfaction. His negative,
sombre mood did not pertain to the revision as such. His rejection
had more to do with the spirit of the new constitution than with its
provisions, even though he did object to some of the latter. The
Constitution, Groen argued, has not been revised in an anti-revolu-
tionary spirit in line with national traditions, but rather in accor-
dance with liberal conceptions, and its foundation is not the sover-
eignty of the monarch but the sovereignty of the people. It does not
hark back to Netherlandic and Christian-historical traditions but
to those of the Revolution: "The constitution has come to us via
Paris and Brussels." Groen believed that some of the formulations
in the revised Constitution cleared the way for dangerous, un-
Netherlandic fallacies. He mentioned three points: the reduction in
the power of the King; direct elections for members of Parliament;
and the make-up of the First Chamber or upper house.
Groen was not opposed to extending the franchise in and of
itself. If anything, he wanted greater popular influence, not less.
Later, during debates about the level of taxes that would qualify
a citizen to vote, he declared that he would always be quite pre-
pared "to stay one guilder below the liberals." Throughout his life
Groen felt that he represented "the people behind the voters."
As for direct elections, his demurral again pertained to the
thinking behind the concept. It was meant to give effect to popular
sovereignty. He opposed an extension of the franchise "for the
sake of granting the people sovereign powers to dictate its wishes

to the existing authorities." He opposed the introduction of direct
elections "in the interest of installing a form of government in
which the King is reduced to a mere figurehead and the highest
assembly of the land is transformed into the supreme organ—or
the powerless tool!—of a restless majority." That was Groen's
biggest objection to the constitutional changes: the substitution of
popular sovereignty for the sovereignty of the King; replacing the
divine right of government with the rights of man and citizen.
Groen favoured a "tempered inonarchy," a kind of mixed constitu-
tion in which the prince is sovereign but in no way omnipotent—
not an autocrat but a monarch limited to his sphere of authority,
bound by his responsibility to God, restricted by the rights and
liberties of the people. To judge from his proposals of 1840, from
his approval of many articles in the Constitution of 1848, and from
his battle for the rights of parliament after 1849, Groen's ideal of
a tempered monarchy could in practice agree on many points with
the wording of the liberal proposals.
Agree with the wording—not with the spirit. Hence his
extensive polemics with liberals like Thorbecke and conservatives
like Vreede about the sovereignty of the King. Groen would not
give in to a liberal interpretation of it. In that interpretation, direct
elections and a broader franchise smacked too much of popular
sovereignty.
That kind of democracy would also, he feared, bring loss of
quality. Liberty of the people is an abstraction, their equality is a
fiction, and their fraternity will result in beer-hall politics and
political quackery. "So long as I want to avoid being sloppily
dressed," he wrote in Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap, "I
would hate to have some scholar or statesman personally take
charge of tailoring my coat or cobbling my shoes; and I am equally
fearful if artisans, however skilful in their craft, were mandated to
run the State."
The 19th-century aristocrat Groen van Prinsterer could not see

it any other way: every occupation needs its skilful practitioners,
and so also in governing. Not every Tom, Dick or Harry can be
expected to know the craft of statesmanship. Groen did not indi-
cate where exactly he would want to draw the line for eligibility to
vote, nor did he come up with an alternative for direct elections.
He did not show concretely how he would want to have his anti-
revolutionary theory and his Christian-historical interpretation of
popular liberties formulated in the articles of the Constitution. Not
being very specific was his weak point. But Groen was concerned
about deeper issues. He spoke for the divine origin of authority. He
did not want to see "the higher powers" of Romans 13 replaced by
the notion of popular sovereignty. The powers that be "are God's
ministers to thee for good"—that last phrase is part of the text,
even though Groen in the eyes of later generations might have put
more emphasis on the latter and less on the former, more at least
than he did in his opposition to those who denied the whole text.
Groen's political testimony was in the first place an uphill battle
against the spirit of the age. That spirit preached a politics con-
ducted strictly on the horizontal plane, for the sake of founding a
society without religious faith, without God, earthly, man-centred,
one-dimensional. This was the humanism that Groen targeted, no
matter whether decked out as conservative, liberal or socialist. His
prophetic voice called for a spiritual change; the practical imple-
mentation, however important, came second.
As was to be expected, Groen's contemporaries noticed his
weak point and criticized him for it. They called him a conserva-
tive, a reactionary proponent of a Christian state on a Reformed
basis, with the exclusion of those of other faiths. It did not cost
Groen much effort to refute these allegations; his whole public
career was proof that he had "no ambition for the function of
Grand Inquisitor" and that the label of conservative did not fit him.
More difficult was the request that for once he move from theory
to practice. Why had he not given his own draft constitution? In

Constitutional Revision and National Concord he had answered
that question with the comment that what is important is not so
much the forms as the underlying principles. A return to the cor-
rect principles was the indispensable condition for a healthy form
of government. Here Groen's writings betray the influence of the
Historical Law School. He had not wanted to describe a Utopia,
an ideal State, but he had merely proposed what in the given
circumstances seemed feasible in order to realize his principles.
Member of the Second Chamber

Groen did not shy away from moving from the gallery to the floor
of parliament. When the revised Constitution made new elections
necessary, he allowed his name to sta, d in a number of districts.
In several he won a seat in the upp house, but after winning a
run-off election in District Hard ijk he took his seat in the lower
house. It was January 4, 1849.
Groen realized that the work of a parliamentarian might be
detrimental to his peace, his studies, and possibly also his health.
"On the other hand," he wrote, "in the crisis that I believe the
country is facing, I would not want to withdraw from the oppor-
tunity of combatting in the most influential assembly the faulty
notions that have brought us to the edge of ruin, and of defending
as the sole remedy, to the best of my ability, the principles to
which I have devoted my life these twenty years."
Groen's meinbership in the Second Chamber lasted till 180„
with a brief interruption during 1854/55 and a longer, voluntary
absence from 1857 to 1862. It would be a long and important
period in his life. The liberals who had gained the upper hand in
the coup of 1848 had to make good on their promises. Their
mandate was to work out the new fundamental law into concrete
legislation and to transform all Netherlands into a liberal society.
Radical and moderate liberals themselves had their differences of
opinion about the structure and scope of the needed reforms,

reforms which moreover would meet strong resistance from the
conservatives who had been trumped in 1848. Groen and his hand-
ful of anti-revolutionary colleagues would have to determine their
position in distinction from all these currents. The battle over the
principles and shape of the organic legislation required by the
Constitution would not just be a theoretical, almost academic
debate, but would be attended by political conflict—political
passions even of vehement intensity, as we shall see in the
following chapters. The no-popery movement of April 1853 was
not just a conservative plot against Thorbecke but also a conflict
between Protestant and Roman Catholic. The schools question was
the most striking though not the sole political issue in which the
relation between church and state and the quality of the new
constitutional freedoms were at stake. Brewing as well was a con-
test over the administration of the colonies. Constitutional matters
relating to the power of the King over his ministers and the pre-
rogatives of the Crown as against the rights of Parliament went
hand in hand with the gradual development of political party
formation. The Dutch parliamentary system under a constitutional
monarchy would evolve only slowly and not without conflicts. And
the social and economic transformations that nineteenth-century
Holland was undergoing—very slowly at first but very noticeably
around 1870—would not fail to have their political repercussions
as well.
All these things demanded the attention and participation of
the Honourable Member of Parliament Dr. Guillaume Groen van
Prinsterer. He was a member who had to cope with a number of
difficulties all his own. He had to deal with much misrepresen-
tation and vilification regarding his principles and his concrete
political decisions. Inside the house he had only a few fellow anti-
revolutionaries; outside the house he ran into much misunder-
standing, lethargy and dissension, even among friends and fol-
lowers. Groen was up against a general distaste for politics and
political activism, also among the silent majority of Christians in
the land, who were unable to deliver many votes to his party in any
case because the right to vote was limited to the well-to-do.
Repeatedly Groen would be disappointed—by the voters who
dropped him in 1854; by friends who, when it mattered most,
opted for solutions other than his own, as in the dramatic conflict
with prime minister Van der Brugghen in 1857; by colleagues and
supporters who in the end retreated into conservatism at the price
of an anti-revolutionary approach. In 1865 a disillusioned Groen
refused to sit any longer in parliament, and six years later he broke
all ties with his conservative-minded friends.
Despite all these disappointments and setbacks Groen's par-
liamentary career was not without results. No one else did as much
as he for developing parliamentary traditions; no one else was a
champion as he was for the rights, privileges and influence of the
Second Chamber of parliament. His perseverance in setting forth
the anti-revolutionary principles kept alive a school of thought that
would gain a large following in the generations that came after
him. The battle for free Christian schools would ultimately
triumph, not least through his persistence. His contribution to the
battle for the church or—to mention something quite different—for
the abolition of slavery sooner or later bore much fruit, although
not always in the form he had pursued.
Personal trials were not spared Groen either. He could cope
quite well with political strife but felt deeply hurt at being so often
misunderstood or misinterpreted. More than once he complained
what a chore it was to have to explain his principles for the
umpteenth time. Why were people not willing to read what he had
written so many times already? The lack of understanding on the
part of friends touched Groen deeply and caused him much pain.
Then there was the overwhelming amount of work connected with
his many activities which took its toll on his health, never very
robust to begin with. "Where did you ever learn the art of making
48 hours out of 24?" Professor Van Assen once asked him. A
member of parliament, an author of numerous publications, the
editor of the daily De Nederlander from 1850 to 1855—it all cost
a lot of time and effort.
It also cost a lot of money: De Nederlander ran large deficits.
But that was never the main problem for Groen; as a man of
independent means he never had any real fmancial worries. At his
death, the total value of his estate was approximately 2 million
guilders—an enormous amount for that time. Its annual revenue
must have grossed tens of thousands of guilders, used in part to
finance the Groen household which included a valet, butler, cook,
scullery maid, livery man and two gardeners. From his last will
and testament we learn that he bequeathed considerable sums to
nephews and nieces, to various philanthropic societies, to a few
select political associates, to his pastor, to the widow and daughter
of Merle d'Aubigné, and to a son and grandson of Isaac da Costa.
But if he was spared financial worries, worries about his
health were real, though in those hectic years it was better than
ever. Going for long walks in the parkland of his estate "Oud-
Wassenaar" did him good, as did horse-riding and sea-bathing, and
now and then a summer vacation trip, as in 1855, when Betsy and
he visited England and Scotland. Still, there were often long
periods during the winter months when he could not risk going out
to brave the raw weather. As well, his right hand always caused
him much pain when writing; increasingly as the years went by,
his wife became the writer or copyist of his letters (which became
shorter and more concise as a result). Friends would complain
sometimes: they were used to speedier replies from Groen, who
had always reacted promptly. Then Groen had to admit that he
was a tardy correspondent for whom the writing of personal letters
had become a physical challenge and almost an impossibility
owing to his crowded agenda as well as the growing number of his
correspondents. For important issues he began to refer more and

more frequently to his publications: friends and anyone interested
would have to make do with those as a substitute for a personal
letter.
Chapter 5
In the Political Arena
P Van Assen of Leyden kept up a steady and often witty

r correspondence with his much admired former student and
friend Groen van Prinsterer. In 1848 Van Assen busied himself
with passing on to Groen all sorts of news items and gossip about
his colleague in the law faculty, Thorbecke. Van Assen, who was
turning more conservative all the time, felt a strong personal
dislike for his successful younger colleague who was so popular
with the students. In December, Groen for once gave him a gentle
rap over the knuckles. I don't agree with you about Thorbecke, he
wrote; "it would have been very wrong if he had not been elected
to the Second Chamber." Groen thought it was only right that
Thorbecke, "the soul of the present-day movement for constitu-
tional reform," could now at least participate in the deliberations
of the lower house of parliament. But he was not at all pleased
about the fact that Thorbecke had been kept out of the Govern-
ment. On the very first day that they met each other in the lobby of
the parliament building, Groen invited Thorbecke to dinner at his
house.
The political situation in 1848/49

Politically speaking, Groen had ambivalent feelings about his old
friend at this time. The newly appointed Ministry was led by
Donker Curtius and De Kempenaer. In view of its origin and prin-
ciples, Groen felt it was "a Thorbecke Ministry without Thor-
becke." At first Groen to some extent had set his hopes on it, but
In the Political Arena 87
it soon disappointed him: it accomplished little. Thus he welcomed

the day, some eighteen months later, on which Thorbecke present-
ed his cabinet to the Chamber. There was no doubt in Green's
mind that under Thorbecke's leadership, vacillation and inertia
would come to an end and make way for energy and resolve. A
truly liberal regulation of freedom of assembly, of freedom for
private education and the regulation of public education, and much
more, could rightly be expected from Thorbecke. Had he not him-
self said, when asked about his political program: Just watch us!
Soon, however, it became plain to Green that he could do little
else but oppose the new minister. Thorbecke's slogan "Just watch
us" turned out to mean, among other things, that he would rather
not talk about the philosophy behind his politics. That was
unacceptable to Green. His supporters in the Chamber were lim-
ited to three: Aeneas baron Mackay (the Elder), Willem baron van
Lynden, and Johan Frederik baron van Reede van Oudtshoorn. But
Groen also hoped for support among many conservatives and con-
servative liberals who were in favour of preserving the Christian
character of the Netherlands. He reckoned that they would take his
side once he opened their eyes to the Revolutionary nature of Thor-
becke's liberal policies and set against them anti-revolutionary
alternatives that were more in line with Christian principles and
national traditions. The need of the hour was a fundamental debate
about the foundations of government— exactly what Green always
regarded as the very heart of politics and the indispensable con-
dition for the business of law-making.
Popular sovereignty or popular liberties?

For the first while, therefore, Green paid a great deal of attention
to the question of sovereignty. In opposition to a whole series of
men—Thorbecke, Professor Vreede from Utrecht, the liberal Jan
Heemskerk Bzn who rarely spoke up, and a number of other mem-
bers of the Chamber—Green defended the standpoint during the
session of 1849/50 that the House of Orange was the hereditary

proprietor of the sovereign power. In this, of course, Groen was
not so much interested in honouring history and following a par-
ticular constitutional theory as in reining in the doctrine of popular
sovereignty which wanted to make the King over into an ornament,
a mere figurehead, or at most an agent of the popular will. The
political situation of the day called for a fundamental debate about
the issue.
Among Thorbecke's enemies the rumour was widespread that
he had his sights set on a republic. That was not true; Thorbecke
was in favour of the monarchy, but he also desired a clear demar-
cation between the role of the Crown (the King and his ministers)
and that of the representatives of the people assembled in
Parliament. The Crown was to rule; and since the King can do no
wrong the ministers would be accountable to Parliament, and of
course the actions of the King and the ministers should not con-
tradict each other. What the internal relations of the Crown were
to be under this system would remain a palace secret, according to
Thorbecke. As a minister, however, Thorbecke had to get along
with King William III, who had succeeded his father after his
death in 1849. The personalities of the king and his chief minister
were polar opposites. They differed widely in their bearing and in
their approach to politics. The result was that they clashed
repeatedly. Step by step the minister tried to push through his will
as well as curtail the areas in which the King could make his own
personal decisions.
The way Thorbecke dealt with the King and with political op-
ponents was not always very tactful. Many experienced the inscru-
table minister as rigid and reserved, hard and haughty. So often he
was far more in command of the facts than his opponents, and at
times he did not hide this either—in any case he seldom took the
time to sweeten the pill for the other man. For that matter, because
his opponents were so divided, his position in Parliament was un-
assailable for the moment: he could give himself plenty of latitude.

As a result, people began to spread rumours about his domineering
personality and his republican sympathies. Is it any wonder that
Groen used the opportunity to force Thorbecke to refute these
rumours by declaring himself opposed to popular sovereignty and
in favour of Groen's tempered monarchy—and if he refused to do
so, to draw many supporters away from him? "More than ever, the
struggle over principles is personified in Thorbecke and myself,"
Groen wrote in March 1850. Groen's stance was necessitated by
Thorbecke's measures. The Electoral Law sponsored by his Gov-
ernment brought direct elections, which Groen rejected, as we saw,
because of their link to the idea of popular sovereignty. As well,
Groen had to register his negative vote against the Provincial Act
because it strengthened administrative centralism and weakened
the tradition of decentralized government.
Public relief or church diaconate?

Very telling in this connection is Groen's strenuous opposition to
a proposed Poor Law. This law would have the government regu-
late not only the public care for the poor but also "the position of
the church boards for poor relief in relation to other philanthropic
institutions and civil authorities," because (thus ran the preamble)
"it is in the interest of the State that the different philanthropic
institutions operate in an orderly fashion in order to achieve the
common objective." When it came to socio-economic affairs of
this kind, Thorbecke was not an inflexible adherent to the well-
known principle of laissez-faire. On the contrary, his bill for poor
relief would give the State a predominant position in this field and
not allow for private poor relief except under strict government
supervision.
Groen's opposition to the bill was pointed and unyielding. His
objections were twofold. He opposed the proposed regulation, first
of all because he opposed giving too much power to government,
and secondly because he feared for the freedom of the Church.

Care for the poor was, if anything, a church matter. By seeking to
put diaconal services under state supervision the government was
acting "un-liberally," extending its power over areas that were
none of its business. The Church and its activities, including its
diaconal services, not only ought to be protected from government
intrusion but ought to have its freedom guaranteed by the govern-
ment. Groen therefore placed himself squarely behind a letter to
the government from the consistory of the Secession Church in
Arnhem. In that letter the consistory declared in advance that if
parliament passed the bill, a bill in which it detected "communis-
tic" influences, it would under no circumstances coinply with it. In
their defence Green argued that they were not refusing to obey the
law, as a small majority in the Chamber judged, but that they were
obeying a higher law, for conscience' sake, in obedience to what
they took to be the Law of God.
If the proposed regulation of poor relief was a big disappoint-
ment for Green, he was even more disappointed by the govern-
ment's failure to introduce an education bill. This was for him the
most important part of Thorbecke's mandate. And the road was
clear, since freedom of education was guaranteed in the Constitu-
tion of 1848. Why was the organization of public education left in
limbo? Again and again Groen raised the issue, but to no avail.
In Green's estimation, the issue of poor relief was a clear illus-
tration of the gulf between liberal and Christian politics. As far as
he was concerned, it would be all right if it caused the downfall of
the Thorbecke Ministry. In 1853 it did fall, but not as a result of
the debate about the poor bill.
The no popery movement of 1853

-
The Constitution of 1848 had enshrined freedom of religion. This

meant that the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands no
longer needed any permission to appoint bishops and restore the
hierarchy which had been banned since the Eighty Years' War.
The war of independence from Catholic Spain (1568-1648) had
established the Dutch state with a privileged position for the
Reformed Church. In 1853 the Pope in Rome announced that he
would reinstate the Catholic hierarchy in the Netherlands. On that
occasion he gave a speech in which he lamented "the great calam-
ity and misery that was inflicted on the erstwhile thriving Church
in the Low Countries by the Calvinistic heresy." The pope hoped
that by reinstalling an archbishop in Utrecht that once famous see
would be resurrected from the grave and restored to the glory that
had been its portion under his predecessor, the late Paul IV of
blessed memory.
No sooner did the papal plans and the speech become known
than a storm of indignation arose. When people were reminded of
the "blessed memory" of Pope Paul IV they remembered that he
too, in 1559, on the eve of the wars of religion, had introduced a
new ecclesiastical organization for the Low Countries. They re-
membered the Spanish Inquisition, the persecution of the "Calvi-
nistic heresy," and the great Revolt of their ancestors in support of
which they had pledged their lives and fortunes. Imagine, once
again an archbishop in the Netherlands—in Utrecht, of all places,
the bulwark of the Great Protestant party! Think of it, a successor
to Granvelle, the infamous cardinal, in the city of Voetius, the
great Reformed theologian of 17th-century fame!
Evidently, tolerance for Roman Catholics was not yet deeply
rooted in this traditionally Protestant country. The papal plans
awakened every last trace of anti-papist sentiments. In 1853,
people were closer to the Eighty Years' War than they are today.
Had that heroic struggle been for naught, they asked? The indig-
nation sought an outlet in "no popery" riots and in a flood of pam-
phlets and broadsides filled with crude sentiment, accompanied by
the cry: "Protestants, wordt wakker [awake]; remember Jan de
Bakker!"—alluding to the Protestant martyr who was burned at
the stake in The Hague in 1525. Street-hawkers sold toy paper

harlequins: "Here's a bishop on a string, you can also make him
swing!" T he council of the Reformed Church of Utrecht launched
a campaign for presenting a petition. Surely, the King—descen-
dant of the princes of Orange who had established Dutch liberty
and sealed it with their blood—the King would not endorse this
outrage to the feelings of all Protestants by the installation of
bishops who recognized a foreign prince, the Pope of Rome, as
head of the Church? The petition had to be addressed to the King,
for one could not expect anything from his ministers. Thorbecke
stated in the Chamber that the government had no say over the
appointment of bishops: by virtue of the Constitution every church
denomination, including the Roman Catholic, was free in its inter-
nal arrangements.
Meanwhile party politics had seized upon the issue. The con-
servatives and the moderate liberals saw their chance to get rid of
the haughty Thorbecke.
Groen van Prinsterer did not think all that highly of the men
who suddenly wanted to champion the Protestant character of the
country over against Rome. But neither did he welcome the
restoration of the hierarchy; he believed that the Church of Rome
in many ways opposed true Biblical religion. Under the Consti-
tution of 1848, however, the internal organization of a church
could not be interfered with. He communicated this opinion to Pro-
fessor Vreede of Utrecht, one of the leaders of the Great Protestant
party in whose eyes Groen's support would be very valuable.
However, Groen saw through the political intent of the no-popery
movement and did not want Protestantism to be used as a cloak for
the purpose of causing the fall of the Government. In addition,
Groen utterly abhorred state interference with purely church
affairs, no matter whether it concerned the Reformed Church or
any other church. Accordingly, he did his best in the editorial
pages of De Nederlander to calm down the agitated tempers.
More than anything Groen longed for a revival of Protestantism

in his country. From that point of view he welcomed the no-popery
movement. But was it really a sign of a revival of Protestantism?
His prime objective on this occasion was to make clear how the
Christian-historical school was distinct from both reactionary
conservatism and Rome-oriented Ultramontanism. He wanted the
Netherlands to uphold its Protestant character as a state, born as
it was of the Protestant Reformation. Accordingly, he was not
happy with the revival of Ultramontanism. Yet in no way did he
want to expel Roman Catholics or restrict their religious liberties.
That is why he condemned the Utrecht movement as a revival of
the 16th-century ultra-Calvinism of Petrus Dathenus. who had
always resisted the toleration policy of William the Silent. Groen
did not want to combat the Ultramontane danger by curtailing
religion but, rather, by reviving the Church in which the Word of
God ruled supreme. In the no-popery movement of April 1853 he
also tasted the strength of a Protestantism that was conservative
and patriotic but not orthodox and evangelical. Moreover, Groen
did not forget that the Roman church also harboured "precious
truth, albeit obscured" and that Rome was therefore a potential
ally against the Revolution.
On April 15, 1853 the Utrecht petition was submitted to King
William III in Amsterdam by a delegation led by the pastor-poet
Bernard ter Haar. In his speech Ter Haar predicted fatal discord
if the bishops were to come—calamities and woes which threat-
ened the Fatherland and against which he, on behalf of the tens of
thousands who had signed the petition, begged and beseeched the
Royal Throne for protection. The King answered the delegation
that his reign had brought him many sorry moments, but that he
had always been "encouraged by the childlike love of his subjects."
And, surveying the group of dignified gentlemen, he added: "This
day has only reinforced the bond between the House of Orange and
the Netherlands and has made it even more precious to my heart."
That was a fine response—but a hollow one. The King had not
said a word about the heart of the matter; he had not so much as
alluded to any action to be taken against the appointment of
bishops. Still, the words of His Majesty contained more than one
would think upon first hearing them. Precisely by giving this reply
the King deviated from the advice of his chief minister. Thorbecke
had wanted the King to coolly turn away the delegation with a
reference to the constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion for
everyone. The King threw this advice to the winds—on purpose.
Not because he wanted to accoinmodate the wish of the delegation,
but because he wanted above all to be rid of Thorbecke. The
latter's demand that His Majesty either follow the policy of his
ministers or else fire them was answered by His Majesty with a
curt and matter-of-fact letter of dismissal. The day before, he had
taken the precaution of getting Floris van Hall to assure him that
he was willing and able to form a cabinet. With this assurance in
his pocket the King deliberately went against Thorbecke. He did
not commit a coup, nor did he desire a revision of the constitution
in a conservative sense, as inany then thought; he just wanted to
get rid of Thorbecke.
The Van Hall Ministry, once installed, immediately dissolved
the Chamber and called an election. In the ensuing campaign the
passions aroused by the no-popery movement were still very
strong. Few were able to understand, let alone appreciate, Groen's
distinctive standpoint, which was neither liberal nor conservative.
He was not re-elected.
Liberal attacks
Contributing to that disappointing outcome, no doubt, were the
attacks by the liberals on Groen's ideas. The liberals resented
Groen's calling them children of the French Revolution. They saw
in Groen the intellectual leader who threatened truth, liberty and
progress with reactionary attempts to turn back the clock. Was
that not the very current which by means of the no-popery move-
ment had already succeeded in causing Thorbecke to stumble?
In the summer of 1853, a history teacher in Leyden, not yet 30
years old, launched a counterattack on Groen. His name was
Robert Fruin but nobody had ever heard of him. The Anti Revolu-
-
tionary Constitutional Law of Groen van Prinsterer Explained

and Evaluated was a clever and cutting piece of work. Had Groen
called the liberals Revolutionaries? What else was he himself but
a confused counter-revolutionary who quoted Bible texts to defend
a medieval type of absolutism and who, furthermore, contradicted
himself and choked on fallacious interpretations of history and
liberalism?
Professor Bake wrote Groen to let him know that in his opinion
"Dr. Fruin has grossly neglected to observe the proper courtesy."
However, a great number of writers who now entered the fray in
the controversy between Fruin and Gwen went much further than
the assailant. Gwen was painted a dyed-in-the-wool reactionary.
After Groen's death Fruin could still sigh: "How was it possible
that a man of such talents had really believed in that anti-revolu-
tionary system?" Such was the wide gulf between liberals and
believers, between the then triumphant liberalism and historic
Christianity.
It would not be the last time that Fruin condemned Groen's
political activity. But when Fruin in 1858 published his Tien
Jaren, a classic study of the opening decade of the Eighty Year's
War, Groen acknowledged: "I am very fond of his historical
essays." In a personal letter to Fruin, Groen wrote that he would
not want to give the impression that he underrated his qualities as
an historian just because they differed with regard to principles.
End of a five year struggle

-
Groen's absence from parliament did not last long: from June 1854
to September 1855. To his own surprise, a by-election in The
Hague returned him to the Second Chamber. The surprise was all
the greater because at the time the anti-revolutionary movement
was not doing all that well. This became apparent when De Neder-
lander ceased publication. In 1850 Groen had become co-owner
and for all practical purposes chief editor of this newspaper
published in Utrecht by the firm of Kemink. He had not wanted to
let the opportunity go by of having his own organ which could
function as a banner and weather-vane around which to rally his
party, even though it would cost him inany thousands of guilders.
For five long years Groen carried on the work of newspaper editor,
but then it had to come to a stop. Attempts at finding someone who
could take over the daily task had not been successful and the
number of subscribers was down to fewer than four hundred. In a
long series of editorials in the final fourteen issues of De Neder-
lander Groen assessed the results of his five-year struggle. He
would explain to his readers one last time why the movement for
which he stood was not counter-revolutionary, reactionary or
stationary, but anti-revolutionary. It is a movement
which finds unwavering support in Revelation and History

and for that reason must set itself:
Against the keynote of our age;
Against the self-idolization of man that places the origin of
truth and justice in human reason and human consent;
Against the doctrine which, by denying the highest truth,
turns relations upside down in every domain of law and
morality; in short,
Against The Revolution.
The series concluded with three suggestions: We must not forget

the distinctiveness of the anti-revolutionary position, nor its un-
deniable right to a place in State and Church, nor yet the pre-
eininence of the struggle against unbelief and revolution.
The failure of an education bill

An opportunity to demonstrate the distinctiveness of the anti-revo-
lutionary position was not long in coming. The no-popery move-
ment had brought the Van Hall Ministry, but Groen never expect-
ed much from it. Rather quickly he came to blows with minister
Van Reenen, who had sent a circular to inunicipal governments
which tended to discourage the granting of permission for estab-
lishing private schools. And when the minister tabled a Primary
Education Bill, it did not appeal to Groen one whit. The proposal
did uphold the constitutional freedom to establish private schools
but without any financial compensation. And the public school
was to remain a mixed school which at most, by way of rare
exception, could be separated along religious lines if local circum-
stances made that desirable and feasible. To many supporters of
public education the local option of separation was already too big
a concession. That was the view, for exainple, of Professor Petrus
Hofstede de Groot of Groningen. Not only was he one of the
leaders of the Groningen School in church and theology, but as a
school inspector he also tried to push his modernist and nation-
alistic ideas. He wanted a mixed school that would be acceptable
to people of all persuasions (except the Jewish religion), and that
would provide instruction, independently of all dogmas, in the
"Christian and civic virtues" of 1806 notoriety.
There were many supporters of such a school in the Second
Chamber and their combined weight produced an amendment to
the education bill. When the amendment passed, the local option
of separation by religion was gone and what remained was the one
public school for all religious persuasions, to be serviceable to "the
promotion of religion and morality."
No decision had been made with respect to the Van Reenen bill
when the Van Hall Ministry resigned in 1856. But so much
resistance had arisen in the land—as evidenced, for example, in a
petition drawn up by Rev. Heldring and signed by more than 150
fellow Reformed pastors, a document in which Groen had also had

a hand—that the King looked for ways to restore the peace. He
first had an official approach Groen, but for a variety of reasons
the invitation to form a cabinet finally went to Justinus Jacob
Leonard van der Brugghen. A known anti-revolutionary, Van der
Brugghen was to head a cabinet that would have to follow a course
with respect to school legislation different from that of the out-
going ministry. Ostensibly, no misunderstanding seemed possible
about the tack that Van der Brugghen would follow. He was an
attorney from the city of Nymegen and was well-known for his
support of private schools and Christian education. He was the
founder of the first Christian teacher's college in the country. For
a short term he had sat as an anti-revolutionary in the Chamber.
Nothing but good was therefore to be expected from him. And yet
he would be the one to bring profound disappointment to the
supporters of Christian education and to cause Groen to abruptly
and demonstratively resign his seat in the Chamber.
Groen and Van der Brugghen

Right at the start of his new term in the Second Chamber, Groen
wrote a letter to Van der Brugghen: Are there any differences
between us? — No, was the forthright answer from Nymegen; no
differences, just nuances. I place more emphasis on personal con-
version and personal conduct as a Christian in politics. I do not see
much point in Christian institutions such as a Christian state.
This letter of October 1855 revealed that Van der Brugghen
belonged to what later began to be called the Ethicist School. For
him, living the Christian life took precedence over Christian doc-
trine. Religion was a matter of inner conviction. Van der Brugghen
had no use for juridical-confessional action against those who
assailed the doctrine of truth in the church. In his view "Christian
politics" did not exist: Christianity had no constitutional theory of
its own about the best form of government, as little as it had its
own agricultural science, mathematics or history. The Christian

faith can only exert a cleansing and purifying influence on all those
who work in the human activities of education, business or
politics. "Christians in politics will not be able to erect a visible
Christian state, but as priests of the truth they can enter the lists
against the lie, in order that God their King wield spiritual domin-
ion over the hearts of men."
No Christian politics, no Christian state—and no Christian
government school either! When the new Primary Education Bill
of the Van der Brugghen Ministry was made public, the major
difference with the (amended) bill of Van Reenen was that the
public state school was again to instruct "in all Christian and civic
virtues." Next to this mixed, common Christian school, the free
Christian school—this was essential to Van der Brugghen's line of
thinking—would in certain cases be eligible for government
subsidy.
According to the majority in the Chamber, however, Van der
Brugghen's proposal went much too far. By amendment, the pos-
sibility of subsidy was struck. Did the bill now differ at all from
the Van Reenen bill? Not really. But Van der Brugghen stood by
his bill in the amended form. He did not resign. A minister who
had come into office in order to satisfy the opponents of the Van
Reenen bill was now defending a bill that was no different. From
the point of view of political clarity, this was unpalatable.
Van der Brugghen personally had no difficulty with the way
things were turning out. He had never held the view that a govern-
ment could sponsor instruction in Christian doctrine. That the sub-
sidy clause was scrapped was lamentable but not insurmountable:
private schools are better off anyway when they are financially
independent, relying only on the parents. Moreover, Van der Brug-
ghen knew that the King wanted him to stay on: another Thorbecke
Ministry would be most unpleasant for him and would certainly
not settle the political differences.
The tragic conflict

On July 20, 1857 the Second Chamber passed the Primary Educa-
tion Act with a vote of 47 against 13; all the liberals and all the
conservatives voted in favour, only the anti-revolutionaries and
half the Catholic members voted against. As soon as the result was
announced, Groen got up from his seat and walked out of the
Chamber. On his behalf, Baron Van Lynden handed a letter to the
Speaker. "With sorrow, but proinpted by a sense of duty," Groen
van Prinsterer resigned his seat in the Chamber then and there.
This was his way of signalling, in a demonstrative and unambig-
uous manner, what extraordinary weight he attached to the way
affairs had been conducted and to the net result it had produced.
Green was deeply disappointed in Van der Brugghen. He even
declined to call him "friend" any longer. And when on the follow-
ing day Van der Brugghen extended a brotherly hand to him Green
refused it unless Van der Brugghen was willing to confess guilt.
The painful conflict of 1857 was never healed. Twenty years later,
in the very last months of his life, Green published a "historical
contribution" about the conflict, in which he strictly maintained his
condemnation of Van der Brugghen's conduct in the year 1857.
There is something tragic about the conflict of 1857. Prior to
accepting the post of minister, Van der Brugghen had driven out
to "Oud-Wassenaar" to be assured of the support in parliament by
Green as leader of the anti-revolutionaries. The conversation
which then took place had caused confusion in the minds of both
men. Van der Brugghen got the impression that Green agreed in
broad outline with his explanation of the course to follow in the
coming session. And Green did not get the impression that Van der
Brugghen was pursuing a solution that differed in essential points
from his own. Of course Green was aware that there were dif-
ferences between his juridical-confessional approach and Van der
Brugghen's more "ethically" tinged standpoint. He knew that Van
der Brugghen was more in favour of private Christian schools and
less enamoured of the public school. But Groen seemed "willingly

blind": he did not want to believe that their standpoints with re-
spect to the public school diverged in any significant way. It cer-
tainly appears as if the two gentlemen that afternoon at "Oud-
Wassenaar" had talked right past each other and, filled with per-
sonal feelings of goodwill towards one another, had not been very
specific. This may explain why Van der Brugghen's policy state-
ment right at the opening of the session, followed later by his
education bill, ineant a very painful confrontation with reality for
Groen. His friend now turned out to be in favour of the common
Christian public school according to the formula of 1806—the
very thing that Groen had gone to war against for many years
already! Groen wanted an orthodox Christian school because a
"common" Christianity was no Christianity. Groen wanted an
orthodox Christian state school (albeit separated, depending on
local conditions, into a Catholic and a Reformed school), because
the Dutch state, born of the Reformation and established on the
Reformed religion, could not do otherwise. To engage in politics
as a Christian ineant for him, unlike for Van der Brugghen, not
just to work from a personal inspiration based on the Bible, but to
pursue a Christian politics, a Christian state, a Christian public
school. For Groen, politics and government were not neutral, tech-
nical areas where Christians too, motivated by their personal
beliefs, could be active. Politics, government, education were
institutions that ought to fall entirely under the law of God.
When viewed in this light, the conflict between Groen van
Prinsterer and Van der Brugghen marked a collision between two
very real and fundamentally different conceptions. It was no
wonder that Groen, who was always keen on distinguishing clearly
and precisely what anti-revolutionary thinking entailed, reacted so
strongly and that he underscored his standpoint by resigning his
seat. He understood, moreover, that it would be a long time before
the distribution of political power, which had seemed so favour-
able in 1856/57, would allow for a renewed discussion of the

schools question.
The free school

Still, the events of 1857 remain tragic. Van der Brugghen felt mis-
understood and shunned. Even the teacher's college in Nymegen,
for which he had sacrificed so much money, time and effort, was
taken away from him: many of its backers made their continued
support conditional on Van der Brugghen's resignation from the
board. To save it, he no longer set foot in the school, where he
used to be busy, often at the crack of dawn, doing administrative
work or preparing lessons. But even more than on account of this
personal element, Van der Brugghen's conflict with Groen remains
tragic since the type of school that he favoured—the free, parent-
controlled Christian school—was the type of school that would
ultimately emerge triumphant from the schools struggle. After
1857 even Groen dropped the idea of public schools separated
according to religious persuasion; he now saw this as an unattain-
able ideal. He too now opted for the private Christian school. The
lesson he drew from the enactment of the Education Bill of 1857
was that the state school would continue to bear the stamp of a
common Christianity. But a common Christianity is worse than no
Christianity and so long as theological modernism continued to
permeate the Church, the term "Christian virtues" corresponded to
reality even less than in 1806.
Groen did fear, however, that many people would allow them-
selves to be lulled to sleep by this reference to "Christian virtues."
It would be essential, therefore, to insist on a full implementation
of the religious neutrality claimed by the state. Justice and honesty
now demanded the removal from the Education Act of the term
"Christian virtues." Having learned from his defeat of 1857, Groen
altered his strategy. Although the Christian government school
remained his ideal to his dying days, at this juncture Groen
acquiesced in the neutral public school. While continuing to regard

this neutrality as evil, but as a necessary evil, he switched to
countering the evil by means of an active campaign for starting as
many private Christian schools as possible. The private school
should be the norm, the public school supplementary. That is
what increasingly became Groen's political program for education.
To promote private education, Groen devoted his energies to the
Association for Christian National Primary Education, an organi-
zation that became a reality in 1860 after overcoming a number of
difficulties. And in the interest of private education Groen again
accepted a seat in the Second Chamber.
For some time already Groen's friends had urged him to return
to parliament. "Why do you not run again?" Baron Van Lynden
had asked; "if our struggle is ongoing, should our captain (of a few
in the Chamber, of thousands outside the Chamber) hesitate to join
the battle?" Groen gave in. He would not campaign for a seat, but
if elected he would again accept membership in parliament. In
September 1862 he was back in the Second Chamber.
This last period in his parliamentary career would not bring the
desired result either. Groen did not get many opportunities to raise
the education question. Neither the Government nor the Chamber
cared to stir up that thorny issue again. Nor did they feel the need
to alter the situation. Although Groen broached the subject of
education whenever possible, neither the liberals nor the con-
servatives rose to the bait. When he fell ill in December of 1862
the disappointed Groen had a reason—an excuse really—not to
show up in the Chamber for several months. He returned in the
spring of 1863. Intimately acquainted with the rules and tactics of
the parliamentary game, he participated skilfully and intelligently
in the debates. They concerned a host of issues, some of which
were subjects in which he was only moderately interested or
considered himself a mere amateur, such as economic and fiscal
I 04 Groen van Prinsterer
matters. But he did his duty, always looking for an opportunity to

raise the education question.
A test for candidates

The year 1864 was another election year. In the Chamber Groen
had repeatedly referred to the fact that he represented the people
and spoke on behalf of the nucleus of the nation because he hap-
pened to be the mouthpiece of the "core" of the national character.
His opponents scornfully shrugged their shoulders at this claim;
the "people behind the voters" did not count in their eyes, and
those who had the vote hardly supported Groen in any significant
numbers. Accordingly, Groen got very busy during the election
campaign of 1864. Pamphlet after pamphlet flowed from his pen,
expounding his political program and his campaign strategy. The
strategy became very specific when he gave this advice: "Vote
only for those candidates who from conviction are prepared to
safeguard Christian National primary education." Thus private
education was to be the shibboleth, the litmus test that would
achieve clarity and unity at the ballot box.
Groen's action was rather unique for its time. Politics was not
organized beyond a few voters' clubs at the local level, political
programs existed no more than did country-wide political parties,
and the Chamber hardly had anything resembling organized caucus
meetings. Politics was still something like an honour, a tradition
and a duty for the upper classes. And here was Groen, launching
a nation-wide election program, insisting on an unambiguous
statement from candidates as to their position on a particular issue
and giving voters explicit advice on how to vote. It was highly
unusual. Fruin even spoke of political immorality: how could a
member of parliament, once he had pledged to his voters to look
after their desire for private schools, declare that he had made no
promises to the electorate and that he would deliberate in the house
"without instruction or consultation," as the Constitution required?
Not just liberals like Fruin were taken aback by Groen's conduct
during the election campaign; so were conservatives. Among their
ranks, too, the battle-cry for Christians schools could cause inter-
nal division, and having independent candidates run for the anti-
revolutionaries might tip the balance in favour of the liberals in not
a few electoral districts. The editor of the leading conservative
newspaper saw trouble ahead. He immediately wrote an open letter
to Groen offering co-operation on the basis of a revised position
with respect to the schools question. Groen was prepared to co-
operate but he insisted on the shibboleth test. And indeed a small
number of conservatives now began to talk more favourably about
private schools.
The new session of parliament did actually have a debate about
education. One conservative spokesmen, Baron Van Zuylen van
Nijevelt, stated openly that he would be "a warm supporter of
whatever can serve to remove the hindrances to private schools."
To everyone's surprise, Groen now introduced an entirely new
solution to the education question. He proposed a revision of
article 194 of the Constitution. That was the article that stipulated
that "the government everywhere provides adequate public
primary education." Groen wanted to end the unfair competition
between free public education subsidized by the state and Christian
schools funded by tuition fees and private donations. At the same
time his proposal would put an end to the moral coercion of
parents who preferred Christian schooling for their children but
could not afford it and so had to send them to the public school. In
1864, however, this proposal did not really stand a chance, so
Groen withdrew it before it could come to a vote. A revision of
article 194 would not be realized until many years later, in 1917,
when a new generation of liberals agreed to it in exchange for
support from anti-revolutionaries for an extension of the franchise.
Retirement from parliament

Even as the debate was still ongoing, Groen fell ill again. After his
recovery, in April of 1865, he resigned his seat. This time for
good. There was little prospect in the foreseeable future ofrevising
the education legislation. Groen van Prinsterer decided that as he
approached the age of 65 he could make better use of his remain-
ing energy at other tasks. But his controversial conduct that had
polarized the elections of 1864 would prove to be a prelude to a
political practice that would later be universally accepted.
Chapter 6
Isolation and Independence
L essstratively
than an hour after Groen on July 20, 1857 had demon-
walked out of the Second Chamber on account of the
passing of the Primary Education Act, Baron Mackay looked him
up in his study at home. He found his friend busy correcting prin-
ter's proofs. Mackay concluded that Groen, having done his duty,
would simply soldier on, his conscience clear. In 1865, Groen's
definitive departure from parliament lacked all that drama, but his
conduct was not much different. To be sure, he did take a short
vacation, but before leaving he assured friend and foe that they
could "count on him for the upcoming campaign," the elections of
1866.
In the ten years still allotted him, Groen would stay active and
could always be counted on to raise his voice in the public square,
however much he would begin to feel the burden of advancing
years. In fact, it was especially during the period of 1866-71 that
Groen and the anti-revolutionary movement underwent momentous
developments. For years, Groen had done his utmost to expound
his Christian-historical worldview and his anti-revolutionary pro-
gram. As clearly as possible he had laid out the fundamental prin-
ciples separating him from both liberalism and conservatism. He
was of the opinion that such a principled isolation only made his
position stronger. In other words, Groen was a proponent of
"ideological polarization" for the sake of political clarity. At the
same time, the clear, independent position achieved by this strategy
in turn made possible pragmatic alliances for specific issues with
political "adversaries," as Groen used to call them. Groen the man

and the politician was no less a strong proponent of co-oper-
ation—co-operation especially with all those who professed the
name of Christ. This last goal was one of the most enduring traits
of Groen's character. He wanted to win associates by giving in on
subordinate points, by travelling two miles with people when they
asked for only one. He always nurtured the hope that by practising
patience and by persisting in explaining his ideas to these half-
hearted supporters he would be able to convince them, educate
them, and get them to travel with him in the right direction.
Groen turns more radical

In the previous chapters we have seen how often Groen was dis-
appointed in his hopes and expectations. Many Christians had a
powerful phobia about politics. This became apparent again and
again in the second half of the 1860's. Repeatedly, many of
Groen's Christian-conservative adherents could not and would not
follow him. Within his own circles he experienced clash after
clash. Each time again, new groups of former associates left Groen
in the lurch. These disappointments accelerated Groen's spiritual
development and fostered an internal process of radicalization
which finally led him to break with his Christian friends. It hap-
pened during the election campaign of 1871. On that occasion
Groen advised the voters not to vote for any of the anti-revolu-
tionary incumbents. He was only willing to endorse the candidacy
of the trio Keuchenius, Kuyper and Van Otterloo. And that is how
the anti-revolutionary party's isolation in terms of fundamental
principles at last led to its independence in practical politics.
A number of circumstances can be named to explain Groen's
increasing radicalization. Around 1870 the Netherlands was begin-
ning to modernize in a faster tempo. New intellectual-spiritual cur-
rents and new social relations were arriving on the scene. The
Révell was, if not over, at least long past its prime. Theological
Isolation and Independence 109
modernism and liberalism had evolved further and become more

widespread, as had, for that matter, orthodoxy. Under the growing
leadership of Dr. Abraham Kuyper, the orthodox people in the
land were gaining in self-confidence and beginning to inake a stir.
In the liberal camp, meanwhile, fresh ideas were developing: self-
styled 'Young Liberals' began to support workingmen's organi-
zations and the socialist movement. The new generation that was
stepping forward only hastened this process and intensified it. For
Groen personally, age played a role as well. His whole life long he
had given his all in the battle for the restoration of the Christian
character of the Dutch nation. To that end he had staked his career
on the battle for the historic confessions in the Church, for Christi-
an content in the nation's schools, and for the application of Chris-
tian-historical principles in the State. His whole life long he had
stood guard by everything that was sacred to him—but the results
seemed so meagre; he was forced to rethink his entire position and
to change his strategy one more time. He was also beginning to be
in a hurry, a hurry that made him more radical. Fresh events,
moreover, forced him to be resolute and to consciously strike out
on new paths. Once again these events occurred in the areas of
church, school and politics.
The colonial question

The general elections of 1866 brought a new anti-revolutionary
representative to the Second Chamber: Dr. Levinus Keuchenius.
Keuchenius had been secretary-general of the Department of
Colonial Affairs and a member of the Council of the Netherlands
East Indies. He was a capable man of great integrity, an ardent
Christian, whose experience and background made him a promis-
ing addition to the anti-revolutionary members in the Chamber,
especially now that the colonial question had become an urgent
issue to deal with.
For several decades, Dutch rule in Java had compelled natives

to grow products for European markets. The drawbacks of this
official system of enforced cultivation were becoming more and
more apparent. The exploitation of the colony in the interest of the
motherland was causing economic stagnation and sorry conditions
in Indonesian society. Liberals demanded that the colonies be
opened up to private enterprise; their creed, after all, banned the
State from economic activity and forbade government from cram-
ping personal freedom, also overseas. Conservatives on the other
hand defended the cultivation system as indispensable for peace,
order and prosperity.
Groen always acknowledged that he had no expertise in colo-
nial policy. Even though his country was an important colonial
power, he seemed to have little interest in the subject. Of course,
as a member of parliament he had to put his mind to colonial
issues, but clearly his heart was not in it. When it came to Dutch
overseas possessions, only the abolition of slavery and the work of
Christian missions interested him. And it was solely in the interest
of parliamentary government as a check against "royal autocracy"
that he strongly defended the right of parliament to scrutinize
colonial policy.
As for the economic benefits of a colonial empire, Groen had
no settled opinion on the merits of either the liberal or the con-
servative system. "Under whatever system," he used to say, "the
indispensable condition for true blessing in colony and motherland
is: Seek ye first the kingdom of God." Gradually, however, he
began to be inore and more critical of the cultivation system. His
friends were divided on the question. Most anti-revolutionaries,
including Groen initially, opted for the conservative system, strip-
ped of a few conspicuous drawbacks. Some of those drawbacks,
for example, were the restrictions placed on gospel missions in the
Indies, the subjection of the indigenous Protestant Church to gov-
ernment regulations, and instances of scandalous treatment of the
native population. On those issues Groen was never unclear. Many

missionaries and missionary agencies benefited from his advice,
assistance and advocacy. In 1844, for example, when missionaries
of the Reformed Church of America experienced nothing but
obstruction in Batavia, the sending church informed Groen about
it, and when their treatment soon improved it may well have been
due to Groen's influence in The Hague. Meanwhile, to other mem-
bers of Groen's political circle the evils mentioned above were
simply inherent in the system followed in the Indies. They managed
gradually to win Groen over to their standpoint. Elout van Soeter-
woude, son of a former liberal colonial reformer, was of the view
that the cultivation system was in need of reform. Isaac Capadose,
an anti-revolutionary civil servant in the Department of Colonial
Affairs, was convinced that the whole system was wrong. What
weighed heaviest with Groen, however, was the opinion of Keu-
chenius. Keuchenius was in favour of a somewhat modified liberal
system, mainly for two reasons: to put an end to the business
community's subservience to politics, and to abolish the "credit
balance" policy that guaranteed a net annual profit for the inother-
land—a policy that he said was born of nothing but Dutch avarice
and "Mammon worship." Here, in Keuchenius, one can detect the
notion that The Netherlands first of all had a calling to fulfill with
respect to its colonies. Abraham Kuyper would later call this Hol-
land's "moral obligation," a concept that he laid at the base of his
government's "ethical policy" for the colonies in 1901. A mark of
Groen's altered view had come nearly forty years earlier, when he
stated in the Chamber that "the needs of the Javanese should not
yield to the credit balance, but the credit balance should yield to
the moral and material well-being of the Javanese."
The Keuchenius motion

The colonial question was to figure very large in the political
struggle of the 1860's. The conflict came to a head, however, over
another weighty issue: the relation between King, ministers, and

parliament—another phase, in other words, of the contest begun
in 1848 over the proper functioning of the constitutional monar-
chy. It had taken some doing in 1866 to form the cabinet headed
by the trio Heemskerk, Van Zuylen van Nijevelt, and Mijer. It was
a cabinet composed of conservative liberals like Jan Heemskerk
Azn and persons who were more or less known as anti-revolu-
tionaries like Jules count Van Zuylen. A not insignificant place in
this company was occupied by the Minister of Colonial Affairs,
Pieter Mijer—significant because this cabinet replaced that of the
liberal Isaac Fransen van de Putte, the cabinet that had tripped
over a new cultivation act for the Indies which had been voted
down by the conservatives and a group of liberals. From Mijer,
therefore, one could expect a cultivation bill revised along conser-
vative lines.
Whatever happened, not the latter. Mijer's colonial budget (one
that he had taken over, for lack of time, from his immediate
predecessor Van der Putte) was passed by the Chamber. Mijer
then promptly resigned, was succeeded in the Department by a
totally unknown person, Nicolaas Trakranen, and three days later
was appointed by royal decree to be the next Governor-General of
the Netherlands East Indies.
During the debates in the Second Chamber about this most
remarkable and in political respects most questionable course of
events, Keuchenius finally tabled a motion, which carried by
majority vote. The famous motion read: "The Chamber, disap-
proving of the conduct of the Cabinet with respect to the resigna-
tion of the Minister of Colonial Affairs, P. Mijer, proceeds to the
order of the day."
The Keuchenius motion—one of the most celebrated in Dutch
parliamentary history—ushered in a volatile period in Dutch
politics. Keuchenius' motives were clear: he viewed the course of
events as evidence of contempt of parliament and "a bait for
political immorality." Above all, he detected in it a failure to

appreciate the needs of the East Indies. Intervention had been
needed for years and now seemed closer with Mijer as minister,
and at this very moment Mijer resigned, to become Governor-
General, in which function he was but an administrator who could
not be expected to initiate renewal and reform.
That aspect of the motion—disapproval of the government's
colonial policy—was more and more overshadowed, however, by
the question whether the motion could pass muster constitu-
tionally. The government did not think so. A Governor-General
was appointed by the King—from nominations by the ministers,
it is true, but nevertheless by virtue of a royal prerogative.
According to Heemskerk and his colleagues, Keuchenius and the
majority of the Chamber which had voted for his motion had
exceeded their competence by assuming a power that was not
theirs. By putting it this way Heemskerk embroiled the King in a
political conflict, hiding as it were behind the person of the King
in an attempt to withdraw the Cabinet from the scrutiny of par-
liament in certain—not unimportant—matters of governance. As
a result, the relation between parliament and government became
the issue in a conflict that was to last for two years. Several times
the Second Chamber was dissolved, yet the elections did not give
Heemskerk a conservative majority; several times a minister suf-
fered a vote of no-confidence and had to step down because the
Chamber refused to comply with the will of the Government.
Finally, in 1868, the Cabinet was forced to retire for good. Thus
the Keuchenius motion became the occasion for the establishment
of full parliamentary government in the Netherlands: no govern-
ment can withdraw its activities from parliamentary scrutiny, and
no government can continue in office without the approval of the
majority of the Chamber.
His motion may have made history but Keuchenius himself
derived little satisfaction from it. Conservatives of every stripe
turned against him and called him "the red Groenian." How was
it possible that a follower of Groen van Prinsterer, who had always
defended Orange and the rights of the Throne, now played into the
hands of the liberals! On all sides people withdrew their confidence
in Keuchenius. He was able to hold on to his seat in the Chamber
only with support from the liberals. About his anti-revolutionary
colleagues in the Chamber Keuchenius wrote that they "still have
little heart for a Christian colonial policy and have little interest
besides in developing one for themselves. . . . They do not know
conditions in the Indies; all they can think of are the millions that
the cultivation system has yielded for years on end for the benefit
of the mother country."
After some time, Keuchenius, deeply disappointed, resigned his
electoral mandate. But he was not reappointed to the Council of
the Indies. He was even refused free passage to the Indies. Petty
revenge, he called it. He returned to Java, a disillusioned and
embittered man, to earn a living for his family as a journalist. Even
there he was not left in peace. At the beginning of 1869, a prom-
inent conservative newspaper in The Hague published a letter by
Keuchenius to an acquaintance, purportedly showing that during
the elections of 1866 he had angled for conservative support by
posing as a conservative, only to come out after the elections as the
radical of the motion of 1866. Keuchenius' career in journalism
did not fare well either. The products of his pen were too frank,
too religious, too progressive for the Europeans in the Indies. As
a result he saw himself compelled to start over again from the
bottom, as he had twenty-five years earlier, by setting up a legal
practice in Batavia. The man who had on many occasions stood in
for the Governor now had to immerse himself once again in law-
suits involving petty domestic quarrels, arrears in rental payments,
and breaches of contract.
Groen and Keuchenius

Whoever may have abandoned Keuchenius, not Groen. Immediate-
ly after the storm broke over the motion, he had come to the aid of
his valued friend, whom he, Groen, more than anyone else, had
persuaded to enter politics.
Unlike most of his conservative—anti-revolutionary adherents,
Groen had no objection to the motion as an expression of indig-
nation at the flagrant breach of proper parliamentary procedure.
He did feel, however, that it had been a tactical error on the part
of Keuchenius to have the motion come to a vote, because in so
doing Keuchenius, who was obviously not supported by a majority
that was homogeneous, had put himself at the mercy of the lib-
erals. Groen was shocked by the conservatism that turned out to
enjoy so much support among his own political friends. Yet that
did not keep him from coming to Keuchenius' defence. He did
everything he could, in publications and personal correspondence,
to stand by him. The underhanded attack on Keuchenius by the
conservatives in January of 1869 was countered by Groen with an
uncommonly combative tract entitled Keuchenius and His Adver-
saries. In this tract he upheld Keuchenius' reputation as a man, as
a politician, and as an anti-revolutionary. Groen declared himself
completely in agreement with what he had read in A Voice from
the East Indies to All and Sundry Including the Netherlands. This
was the tract in which Keuchenius had defended his action and had
pronounced his harsh judgment, quoted above, of the anti-revolu-
tionary members of parliament, adding an unambiguous appeal to
Groen to emancipate himself from such followers. In Keuchenius'
opinion, the Christian-historical school would have no future in the
Netherlands unless it refused to be any longer the toy of the con-
servatives and until it formed its own independent party.
Groen tried unsuccessfully to retain Keuchenius for Dutch
politics. But when Keuchenius left the country Groen gave him an
interest-free loan of five thousand guilders, to be paid back when-
ever convenient. Groen tried to keep Keuchenius' interest in the

anti-revolutionary cause alive: in the years that followed, letter
after letter went to Java—a most pastoral activity that testifies of
Groen's devotion to friends, his knowledge of human nature, and
his tact. Tact was certainly needed in relating to the embittered
Keuchenius who felt abandoned by his own people and who called
his stint as a member of parliament the gloomiest years of his life.
Shortly before departing from the Netherlands, Keuchenius had
aired his grievances and bitterness to Groen one last time. The
latter answered him very tactfully: "You will never be sorry for
having defended in parliament, almost alone, at a most critical
time, the Christian interests of our nation, even at the expense of
your personal interests." But Groen also corrected him: now that
Keuchenius had fulfilled his task so brilliantly he should not be
surprised by the consequences of his conduct or by the way the
opposition judged him "You were usually extremely sharp, all the
more painful for your opponents because factually you were usu-
ally right." That is how a man is able to console who has not been
without similar experiences.
When the Dutch launched a punitive expedition against the
sultanate of Aceh in 1873, Keuchenius called it "a reckless atro-
city without basis in law." Conservatives and liberals alike sup-
ported this policy of colonial expansion, but Green endorsed
Keuchenius' anti-imperialist verdict and on his recommendation
Kuyper published it in De Standaard.
A decade and a half later, in the first Christian cabinet under
Aeneas Mackay Jr., it would be Keuchenius who held the portfolio
of Colonial Affairs.
Nationalism as idolatry
Many people took it ill of Groen that he persisted in supporting
Keuchenius. Green on his part complained repeatedly that his
friends paid lip-service to his ideas but failed to follow him. Which
of them, besides Keuchenius, had spoken up in the Chamber on

behalf of Groen's proposal to revise the education article in the
Constitution? Some of these men who had always passed for anti-
revolutionaries, like Jules van Zuylen van Nijevelt and Theo van
Lynden van Sandenburg, became ministers in conservative-liberal
cabinets. Even foreign policy was to become a cause of alienation
between Groen and his traditionalist Christian friends.
In the course of 1867 Groen penned two vehement but highly
informed and penetrating brochures in which he condemned the
politics of the Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck. For many
years Groen had maintained close contacts with confessing Protes-
tant circles in Germany. He had been very much influenced by the
Berlin Revell. The Lutheran scholar of political philosophy,
Friedrich Julius Stahl, had for some time enjoyed Groen's highest
respect. The Berlin anti-revolutionaries, however, were not want-
ing in admiration for the achievements of Bismarck, who was
bringing the old dream of German unity closer to realization by
means of the "blood and iron" of power politics, as demonstrated
in the utter defeat of Austria by Prussia in the Seven Weeks' War.
Groen felt called to address a brochure to his Berlin friends in
which he characterized the true nature of Bismarck's politics as
"revolutionary" and as asserting the right of the strongest. When
the German friends reacted with shock at this criticism, Groen
wrote a second brochure in which he repeated his warning against
Bismarck. Were Prussians not guilty of making an idol of their
Fatherland? A nationalism of this type, Groen urged, which
believes it can ignore God's commandments in the name of
national interests, is anti-Christian.
Many contemporaries were more optimistic in their judgment
of the international situation. They were startled when Groen, in
discussing the Prussian state, made a reference to the kingdom of
the Antichrist. In their opinion, things were not that bad; besides,
shouldn't one be happy that Protestant Prussia had vanquished
Catholic Austria? In the Netherlands, too, there were people who

concluded that, looking at the outcome, Bismarck's actions were
evidently being blessed. They felt Groen's judgment was too sharp,
his warnings intemperate—too progressive, actually.
Groen was becoming impatient. Nothing is being done and I am
68 years old, he sighed in a letter to the Christian Reformed pastor
Johannes Hendricus Donner. Shall I live long enough to see the
end of the schools struggle? Shall I see any results of my lifelong
struggle for the anti-revolutionary principle?
Church reform
The growing alienation between Groen and his aristocratic-conser-
vative political friends also had church troubles as a background.
In the struggle for restoring the national church as a genuine
Reformed Church there had always been differences between the
juridical-confessional Groen and many of his Revell friends. A
new regulation had taken effect in 1867 allowing local congre-
gations to appoint their own elders and deacons and to extend calls
to pastors of their own choice. The liberal leadership of the
denomination had welcomed this new rule as a way to bring
greater "democracy" to church government. The orthodox people
used the situation to promote reformation from the bottom up by
the "lay" members themselves. Especially the young pastor Dr.
Abraham Kuyper urged the orthodox to make use of this oppor-
tunity. Groen realized that this procedure could lead to conflicts at
the local level between lower and higher church boards. Yet he did
not steer clear of the conflicts. The church had to be restored; the
modernist usurpation had lasted long enough. Was it not evident
week by week that Christ was being denied even from the pulpits?
A few liberal pastors themselves drew the logical conclusion and
exchanged their toga for a civilian suit, like Conrad Busken Huet
and Allard Pierson. Events like that did not fail to affect Groen
personally. He was in regular correspondence with Pierson, who
was a son of a Revell family from Amsterdam, good friends of the

Groens. Groen's letters were frank in discussing their differences
and in appealing to Allard to return to the faith he had once pro-
fessed. Yet Groen could only praise the consistency and honesty of
these men who had the courage of their convictions, however much
he deplored these convictions. But he had absolutely no sympathy
for those modernist preachers who stayed on despite the fact that
they had quite abandoned the Christian faith as confessed in the
church's formularies, who administered baptism not in the name
of the Triune God but in the name of Humanity, and whose ser-
mons openly consigned the resurrection of the dead, the deity of
Christ, and everything that rational minds called incomprehensible
to the realm of legend or myth. In 1864 Groen felt compelled to
enter the lists against one such clergyman, Dr. J. C. Zaalberg. Rev.
Zaalberg, one of the pastors of The Hague, made no secret of his
liberal views and so created quite a stir in the church.
Must we—may we—tolerate this? Does the congregation

have no rights at all? Does doctrinal freedom have no limits
at all? Does the pledge given at ordination have no force at
all? Is there not a single form of blasphemy that ought to be
checked by the church's superintendents in deference to the
conscience of its members?
Thus wrote Groen in his pamphlet Is There No Cause?, which was

actually a reply to a pamphlet by J. H. Gunning, Jr. This pastor of
The Hague had tried to bring peace to his church by pointing out
that apostasy would increase as Christ's return grew closer and
that the only thing asked of every Christian personally was to be
found faithful upon His return. It was against this sort of passivity,
this kind of irenic prose, that Groen protested. Ideas like those of
Zaalberg, he maintained, had no rightful place in the church; they
deserved to be opposed on the basis of church law and the

confessions.
No real action was undertaken against Zaalberg, however. In
reaction, Groen helped found the Confessional Association. Its
purpose, according to its constitution of 1866, was "to expel the
Modernists by means of the ecclesiastical courts." If a local con-
sistory were hindered in pursuing this goal by the higher church
boards, such a consistory would have to separate itself from the
Reformed denomination. In the struggle for church reform Groen
was no longer afraid of disruption and separation. That was the
external side of the profound difference of opinion between Groen
and the ethicist-irenical school. What divided them was the con-
fessions as the standard for the entire life of the church.
The schools issue again

The differences between Groen and the ethicist-irenical school
manifested themselves as well in the field of Christian education.
After the debacle of 1857, Groen's choice for private Christian
schools did not enjoy the undivided support of the ethicists. What
they especially opposed were Groen's efforts to have the state
school observe a strict neutrality and to remove from the law the
stipulation to provide "instruction in all Christian virtues."
Nourished by notions of an established national church and the
Christian character of the nation, they wished to hold on to the
idea, also held earlier by Groen, of a Christian government school.
Even though these schools had by now only a minimum of the
Christian religion, they preferred those over a maximum of the
Christian religion in private schools. Would a government school
system that strictly observed religious neutrality not deliver the
nation's children over to the untrammelled dominance of unbelief?
On this very question there had been a difference of opinion
from the beginning of the Association for Christian National
Primary Education. Back in 1860, when the constitution and by-
laws of C.N.P.E. were drawn up, Groen had done his utmost to
accommodate the ethicists. The Secessionists had been very un-
happy about this because they adhered to the maxim, "The private
school the rule, the state school supplementary." Groen might
have held that position in practice, but he would not go so far as
to accept or prescribe it formally. His accommodating posture with
respect to the ethicists, however, was of no avail. In the spring of
1868, Rev. J. J. P. Valeton, Sr. resigned his membership of the
school association. He did not agree, he wrote Groen, with a num-
ber of things, but what had clinched it for him was the growing
leadership in the school association by prominent members of the
Confessional Association. Valeton wanted to work spiritually, not
organizationally; he acknowledged that he believed less and less in
outward activities and was afraid of the politics and polarization
that would necessarily result from the action of the Confessional
Association. In reply, Groen lectured him that it was precisely this
fear of being an ecclesiastical or political party, this individualism
of the ethicist-irenical school, that was one of the main reasons
why Church and Nation remained at the mercy of the arbitrary
dictates of the adversary.
Valeton's resignation was only the prelude to a much more
vehement conflict. The ethicists generally shared the objections
aired by Valeton against Groen's ecclesiastical and political activ-
ity, including especially his support of the radical Kuyper.
And it was Dr. Kuyper who at the 1869 annual meeting of
C.N.P.E. delivered an address in which he called for a revision of
Article 23 of the Education Act, that is, for scrapping the reference
to "Christian virtues." Kuyper differed from Groen about the pos-
sibility of a Christian state. In practice he was a proponent of a
radical separation of church and state because he regarded the
reigning view of the state, the principle of the socialistic state, as
something "satanic." That is why he wanted everywhere to limit
the power of the state and defmitely curtail state influence in
education. In response to Kuyper's speech an acrimonious dispute

broke out. Nicolaas Beets made himself the mouthpiece of the
ethicist-irenicals in their antipathy toward the Reformed Revival
led by Kuyper and Groen. To give vent to his grave concerns, he
attended the annual meeting, something he had never done before,
and during the discussion period he opened fire. The proposal to
scrap the word Christian from the law Beets called "criminal"; and
Kuyper's characterization of the modern state as a "satanic institu-
tion" he called "demonic."
With that, the two standpoints stood diametrically opposed.
What collided here were two divergent appraisals of modern life,
two clashing views of the nature of church and state and of the
essence of Christian political action.
The difference proved unbridgeable. After a few months Beets
and others resigned their membership in C.N.P.E. which in the
majority followed the policy of its president Groen van Prinsterer.
In the meeting Groen had unambiguously thrown his support
behind Kuyper. The conflict with Beets touched Groen deeply. In
light of his own past he could understand his opponent so well—
yet at the same time he could not offer him anything but the sharp-
est opposition. Groen was in danger of losing heart. As in 1857
and 1866, he had to go through a painful quarrel between brothers
and had to break with people with whom he sympathised and who
were a part of his own past.
Groen's despondency
Groen was so tired of it all that he informed the Utrecht law
professor De Geer van Jutphaas in February of 1870 that he was
going to withdraw from public life and stop publishing his Neder-
landsche Gedachten, a new series that he had just begun. De
Geer's response came by return mail. Why was Groen surprised
by the conflict with Beets, and with Chantepie, Bronsveld and all
those other ethicist ministers? Surely he had known for a long time
that when it came to theology, church and politics they did not side
with Groen but were actually as hostile to him as the liberals and
the modernists? Acknowledge that opposition, forget about co-op-
eration, and our position will be purer and clearer.
De Geer's letter was sharp, radical, and without any consider-
ation for "those ethicist friends who are so little ethical." But he
achieved his goal. Groen, still somewhat hesitant, repeating the
thought three times as if to persuade himself, affirmed to De Geer:
"At bottom I agree with you completely. We have to accept the
battle. Less than ever should we shrink from polemics with the
ethicist-irenical school." Groen resumed his former role, girded up
his loins, and inquired how plans were shaping up for starting a
Christian-historical daily newspaper. The paper was launched two
years later, on April 1, 1872, under the name De Standaard.
Editor-in-chief was Dr. Kuyper. For all its start-up difficulties, the
paper began to make a tremendous contribution to the growth of
the anti-revolutionary party. Moreover, the appearance of a trusted
daily provided the aging Groen with the opportunity to withdraw
from the polemics of the day.
Groen's final break with conservative Christians

The growing alienation between Groen and his Christian friends in
the struggle in church, education and politics made him increas-
ingly aware that he was approaching a crucial turning point in his
life: an open breach with his Christian friends. Changes in strategy
during Groen's career always had a long prehistory. His whole
personality, his habit of turning things over in his mind and weigh-
ing the pros and cons, his need to always look at all nuances,
precluded quick, decisive choices.His loyalty to earlier standpoints,
especially his loyalty to former friends, got him to acknowledge
only with the greatest reluctance that he had to follow a different
course. But once this decision was made, Groen would be radical
in carrying it out and defending it.
Groen was not in the habit of wearing his heart on his sleeve.
His loyalty to friends and associates of earlier days, even after
differences had become apparent, was great. His appreciation for
their qualities remained unabated. And he was glad to underscore
any point on which they agreed. "For all our differences," he wrote
in a private letter, "I always respected Gunning, grew to love him,
and valued him with gratitude as one of the most outstanding
confessors of the Gospel in word and in deed that I have met on
my life's journey." About Beets he declared that in the struggle for
church reform he had been his most formidable opponent; never-
theless, for more than thirty years Beets had been "a powerful and
blessed preacher of Christ and Him crucified." Groen's contem-
poraries did not always understand this kind of separation between
person and principle. As a result, Groen's resolute action during
the elections of 1871 caught them off guard as not only incom-
prehensible and needlessly radical but also as totally unexpected.
Despite all the pressure put on him, Groen stood his ground.
However difficult it was for him, he broke all political connections
with old friends like his nephew Baron van Wassenaer and
endorsed only Keuchenius, Kuyper and Van Otterloo as his
candidates. None but these three, Groen announced, were true
representatives of the anti-revolutionary voice in politics. Anyone
who wanted to support that voice, in particular with respect to
education, had to cast their ballot for this threesome.
Groen's tactical turn-about, however significant as a clear dis-
play of independence in fundamental principles and practical
politics, had been too abrupt and too drastic to be successful in the
short run. None of the three was elected.
Chapter 7
Fighting to the End
he election campaign of 1871 was the last in which Groen

T exerted himself as the factual political leader of his movement.
My work is bounded by the walls of my library, he once joked. To
be sure, he remained the spiritual leader of the anti-revolutionaries;
he continued to stimulate them, advise them, defend them, as he
had always done. But he was happy to leave the issues of the day
to the guidance and direction of others—especially to Dr. Kuyper.
After April 1, 1872, the latter was able, via De Standaard, to
address the Dutch public on a daily basis with unrivalled talent.
Abraham Kuyper: leader in his own right

Groen and Kuyper first became acquainted in 1864. At that time
Kuyper asked Groen's mediation as archivist of the royal family
for obtaining documents from archives in Berlin which Kuyper
needed for his edition of the writings of the Polish reformer John
a Lasco.
Very slowly a more intimate relationship developed between the
eminence grise of the Christian-historical movement and the bril-
liant young pastor who, after his conversion to orthodox Calvinism
in the quiet village of Beesd, soon began to make his voice heard
in broader circles. With great vigour, Kuyper joined the struggle
for church reform as this had entered a new phase since 1867.'As
a minister in Utrecht and then in Amsterdam Kuyper drew large
crowds. He continually initiated new activities and quickly gained
a leading position. His organizational and journalistic talents were

key assets in this.
Groen followed Kuyper's development with intense interest.
Where necessary, he stimulated and advised him. There were vast
differences between the reserved, disciplined, aristocratic man of
law Groen van Prinsterer, and the exuberant populist of unbridled
energy, the theologian Kuyper. With mounting fascination Groen
had to acknowledge that alongside him had arisen a leader of
stature for the orthodox people in the land.
Alongside Groen. The differences between their personalities
and their conduct were too great to be able to say: under Groen.
Kuyper was a leader in his own right. That was fine with Groen.
He had never wanted yes-men as followers. He did not deny the
differences in vision and strategy. When he disagreed with Kuyper
he did not hide it. But outsiders, who never stopped trying to play
Groen off against Kuyper, mistook their man. The same was true
in the case of insiders who complained to Groen and sought his
help whenever they were startled by Kuyper's tempo or surprised
by his radical stance or his tactics. Groen let them know that he no
longer concerned himself with the political action of the day and
confidently left that to Dr. Kuyper. And Dr. Kuyper, he added,
badly needs the trust and support of you, his spiritual kin, against
the fierce attacks of others.
Many people took it ill of Groen that he showed such solidarity
with Kuyper. They reproached him for letting himself be taken in
tow by that demagogue and radical democrat. Quite a number of
these people had already begun, after 1866, to bid goodbye to
Groen on account of his defence of Keuchenius. And if Green's
conflict with Beets had only widened the gap, Kuyper's conduct
made it unbridgeable. Christian people with a sense of history had
abhorred the Revolution and gladly called themselves friends and
followers of Groen. But Kuyper, with his unstoppable energy and
his relentless mobilization of the common people, appeared to them
Fighting to the End 127
as "vulgar" and "radical"—a kind of Cromwell aiming at a dic-

tatorship of the Reformed "little folk." In this way the gap widened
between the old Rived and the new Reformed Revell, and Groen
became more and more isolated from his former Christian friends.
A return to historical writings

The fact that Groen could leave it to Kuyper and others to take
care of the everyday activities and polemics did not mean that he
could now slow down and take it easy. On the contrary, he con-
tinued to be sought out for collaboration, support, information,
guidance. His correspondence increased rather than decreased.
A new series of Nederlandsche Gedachten, which Groen had
started in 1869, demanded much time and energy. His age began
to weigh him down. Every winter he suffered from colds and
asthma attacks that kept him indoors for weeks on end and further
weakened his constitution. Yet the work kept coming in. I am old,
weak and tired, he would sigh, and overburdened with work. Still,
he did not spare himself. Groen's output during the last five years
of his life is simply astonishing.
Next to his swelling correspondence and the Nederlandsche
Gedachten there was the production of fresh historical works. His
passion for such work had never died, had at most been tem-
porarily suppressed by other tasks. After his departure from the
Chamber in 1857 he had started a new series of Archives which
had grown to five volumes. Once he returned to politics he had not
found time for the royal archives. There were difficulties in
arranging for a successor, possibly due in part to Groen's personal
relation to King William III, which was not as good as to the
previous monarchs. A retired army officer fmally took over super-
vision of the archives; a disappointed Groen resigned in 1871.
However, Groen the historian kept on publishing. He contributed
a number of studies when the 50 th anniversary of the restoration of
the Kingdom was celebrated in 1863, and again when the Eighty
Years' War was commemorated a few years later. In his 1813

Remembered in the Light of History and in several other publi-
cations he raised his voice against the bombastic revelry full of
extravagant nationalistic sentiments and smug self-congratulation.
To be sure, Groen felt there were plenty of reasons to be thankful
as a nation for the restoration of liberty and unity. But there were
also reasons for the nation to humble itself. What had the people
of the Netherlands done with the liberty and unity that was
restored? They had listened to the slogans of the Revolution more
than they had paid heed to the call to "fear God and honour the
king." Prospects for the country and its people looked sombre.
Groen therefore closed his occasional essay with a call to repen-
tance. Our nation await only rich promises if we are but conscious
of the need "to return to the God whose favour, forfeited a thou-
sand times, may yet be laid away for us." A third edition of the
Handbook came out in 1871, in places significantly revised, and
supplemented with one of Groen's commemorative pamphlets cov-
ering the last quarter century. That same year Groen had the 1848
brochure Liberty, Equality, Fraternity reprinted and presented as
a gift to every teacher who was a member of the Association for
Christian National Primary Education. A wealthy Amsterdam
businessman underwrote a fourth printing of the Handbook for
free distribution to hundreds of schoolteachers.
Groen's fmal years were especially a time, as he himself put it,
of recapitulation and historical reflection. Sometimes this was
triggered by the publication of someone else's work. A Catholic
author protested against the commemoration of the battle of
Heiligerlee which had opened the Eighty Years' War. What was
there to celebrate for Catholics? What else could Louis of Nassau,
the brother of William the Silent, be in Catholic eyes but a foreign
adventurer, a rogue, and a religious hypocrite? Groen's polemical
nature could not let this pass, all the more because the author's use
of the Archives was unreliable.
Circumstances also induced Groen to cast his mind over his

own lifetime. He had always had a keen sense of the historical
significance of his many contacts with a wide variety of people.
Whether they were lengthy epistles or only brief memos, he had
carefully saved them all, along with his replies and sometimes with
a telling notation, in order that posterity might know the true
course of historical events. Thus in 1876 he published a collection
of letters pertaining to the conflict with Van der Brugghen over the
education bill of 1857. Similarly, he published the correspondence
with his bosom friend Isaac da Costa, with his old friend and pol-
itical opponent Thorbecke, and with Johan Adam Wormser, whom
he had once called his "privy counsellor" from Amsterdam. All
these volumes were frank and honest contributions to the study of
recent history. In Nederlandsche Gedachten he looked back on his
own life. From now on, he wrote on the first page of Volume V,
dated April 1873, this series will be devoted to historical materials,
largely autobiographical. "For far too long I have been swept
along by the issues and debates of the day; after forty years I take
my leave, although for the time being I remain in service to do
work that is more suited to my advancing years." And then
followed an overview, in instalments, of a lifetime of struggles that
Groen had waged.
A controversial beheading
From March 1874 to September 1875 he interrupted the publica-
tion of Nederlandsche Gedachten. Other work had to be given
priority. A new book had come out by John Lothrop Motley, an
American diplomat and historian who was very much interested in
Dutch history. Motley was a liberal who through his studies had
come to admire the Dutch struggle for freedom and independence
from Spain. In Motley's eyes, the Dutch Revolt had been a grand-
iose event and Dutch liberty and tolerance was a glorious legacy
and an inspiring example for all mankind. After first publishing
The Rise of the Dutch Republic he followed it up in 1874 with a

study entitled The Life and Death of John of Barnevelt. It was an
extremely well written book that carries the reader along in the
tangle of events of the Twelve Years' Truce between Spain and the
Republic during 1609-1621, including the story of the controversy
in church and theology over the doctrine of election. Motley had
little sympathy for the strict Calvinists and even less for their
protector, Maurice of Orange, in whom he saw nothing but a
power-hungry prince who condoned, if not contrived, Barnevelt's
execution. By contrast, Barnevelt, the political leader who had
opposed Prince Maurice, was Motley's hero, the champion of
toleration and civil liberty who paid for his life of service to the
country on the scaffold.
Although there had been a few contacts earlier between Motley
the historian and Groen the royal archivist, the latter only learned
of Motley's work through a review of it in a French periodical.
After reading it Groen sighed to his publisher Kemink that it would
be "well-nigh impossible" for him to remain silent. In view of his
age and multiple preoccupations he at first thought that he would
not be able to fmd the time to write a full-length review. Perhaps
he could confine himself to a reprint, with an explanatory fore-
word, of large portions of his Introduction to the volume in the
Archives that covered the period in question. A careful reading of
Motley's book, however, made Groen realize that this plan would
not do. It was quite apparent that Motley had used the Archives
very poorly. Nor had he utilized such pertinent articles as those
that had been published over the years by Robert Fruin.
There was no longer any hesitation in Groen's mind: Motley
deserved a full-length refutation. His book not only misrepresented
the characters of Maurice and Barnevelt, but it also drew a carica-
ture of the controversy over the doctrine of election. Groen conclu-
ded that for all its fine literary qualities, Motley's account rested
on a biased, partisan reading of the primary and secondary sources
and so gave a completely false picture of a period in Dutch history

fraught with controversy. In a letter to one of his friends Groen
formulated his most succinct and most scathing opinion of
Motley's book: "More poetry than history."
And so Groen set to work. Fruin gave him permission to quote
lengthy passages from his works. From a wide variety of sources
Groen dragged up all sorts of citations and strung them together to
form a masterful refutation of Motley's book. It took him months
of hard work, as he admitted himself, months in which he "lived
more in the seventeenth century than in our own." When at last he
was finished, he confided to a friend that "the exertion has been
quite taxing at my old age and I feel very tired." Midway February
1875 Maurice et Barnevelt rolled off the press. It was written in
French in order to vindicate the memory of Maurice and the vital
principle of the Dutch Republic before an international tribunal.
The book does not make for an easy read: it is a fat volume of
direct quotations, texts and archival documents, judiciously
grouped into a whole to present the careful reader with the his-
torical truth. Fruin called it "a collection of exhibits in a lawsuit"
from which anyone who wants to form a judgment in the case can
draw his own unmistakable conclusions.
A Christian historical testament

-
In the fall of 1875 Groen resumed his publication of Nederland-

sche Gedachten. The December issue contained a contribution
formulated as only Groen could, referring to it as "my Christian-
historical Testament, as the end of life draws near":
With the publican's prayer: 0 God, be merciful to me, a

sinner.
With the wisdom of the Heidelberg Catechism: my only
comfort in life and death.
With the shout of joy: I thank God through Jesus Christ our
Lord.
With the battle-cry of the Reformation: Put on the whole
armour of God, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the
Word of God. Verbum Dei manet in aeternum: The
Word of God endures forever.
With the motto: Not a statesman! A confessor of the gospel.
The issue dated April 29, 1876 contained an announcement at the

bottom of the last page stating that the author was seriously ill. All
that work had exhausted his weak constitution.
Groen's death
For many years Groen had complained about his physical weak-
ness and his aging, about being overly tired and overloaded with
work that seemed never to come to an end. Every winter, some-
times even into spring, he was ill or in poor health, and for weeks
on end he dared not go outside. And yet he had persevered—"with
eyes fixed Above, and with grave concerns about church and
nation," and sustained "by the inestimable help of my beloved and
faithful spouse." The illness that confined him to bed toward the
end of April did not appear serious at first. His wife told about it
later—how he had asked her to read from the Bible and recite the
Apostle's Creed, and how he had repeated after her in a weak
voice. Then his condition had worsened. In a state of near-delirium
he seemed to be repeating whole passages from historical authors
he had once read. But later he became calmer. With folded hands
he confessed: "Christ alone."
The end came on May 19, 1876. Mrs. Groen formulated the
sober text of the mourning-card: "Passed away today, my beloved
husband GUILLAUME GROEN VAN PRINSTERER, with unwavering
faith in his Lord and Saviour, to Whom he had dedicated his life."
Four days later he was buried in "Ter Navolging," the cemetery
once founded by his father. At the request of the deceased, the

interment was held in a sober, traditional style. The pallbearers
wore orange on black. Speakers from every level of society
expressed their gratitude at the graveside: the old friend, Elout van
Soeterwoude; Rev. Gunning, who led the funeral and who called
this childless man the father of a great family. Groen's nephews,
Baron van Wassenaer van Catwyck and Thomassen a Thuessink
van der Hoop; Donald Mackay, soon to be the 11th Earl Reay, son
of Groen's friend, who applied a verse from the Aeneid to the
deceased: "The world revolved, he stayed the course"; also Antony
Brummelkamp Jr., the son of Groen's closest Secession friend,
who spoke of the debt his denomination owed the departed ever
since the year 1837. Various pastors spoke, as did Mr. A. Meijer
from Rotterdam, who introduced himself as "but a simple school-
teacher" but a schoolteacher who had experienced the schools
struggle from the beginning! It would also be the teachers' asso-
ciation of the private Christian schools which some eight years
later was allowed to place a large memorial tablet in the wall of
"Ter Navolging." The grave-stone itself was a sober testimony,
just as Groen's life had been a sober testimony: next to names and
dates it bore only a reference to Revelation 7: 9-17.
Mrs. Groen survived her husband by some three years. Their
marriage had been a very good one; we know from some of the
things they themselves have said, and from what others have said
who knew them, that their relationship had been very intimate and
their appreciation for each other had run deep. Betsy Groen felt a
profound loss, but she knew everything was alright, and she
believed in a speedy reunion. As she waited for the Lord to call her
home too, she took care to settle Groen's affairs, look after the
inheritance, and make arrangements for the preservation of his
books, papers and letters, which were donated to the National
Library of the Netherlands. She passed away on March 14, 1879.
Chapter 8
Evaluation
A ssessments of Groen van Prinsterer and his life's work by

.)-contemporaries and later generations have varied from bound-
less admiration to thorough vilification. Leaving both extremes for
what they are, we still have a number of characterizations that
repay a closer examination. They concern both his person and his
Christian-historical worldview.
An impractical idealist?
Groen van Prinsterer is said to have been an impractical ivory-
tower scholar whose aristocratic life-style elevated him far above
the needs of the times and removed him far from the common man.
He propagated a conservative system of thought and was essenti-
ally a man of the past who by his opposition to the liberal prin-
ciples was in danger of becoming an anachronism in his own day.
That is at bottom how many assess the man, even if couched in
words of praise about Groen's great dedication to his ideals, his
enormous productive energy, his intelligence, and his winsome
personality. Now, judging situations and certainly judging people
tends to be very subjective, which is all but impossible to over-
come. We would like to review a couple of facts that appear
important for a more balanced assessment.
Admittedly, while Groen's critical insight and prophetic vision
cannot fail to impress those who study his life and career, they are
also irritated by his intellectualistic approach, his one-sided em-
phasis on principles and starting-points, and his almost patho-
Evaluation 135
logical inability to be specific. It is indeed maddening to see him,

after forty years of political leadership, write very calmly: Do not
look to me for contributions to an anti-revolutionary program for
fiscal, colonial and administrative affairs; for that you will have to
consult other people.
And yet, when we read Groen's books and correspondence we
judge less negatively about his relation to practical affairs. Among
parliamentary historians friend and foe acknowledge his great skill
and talent as a parliamentarian. His leadership of the anti-revolu-
tionary party can scarcely be written off as impractical—provided
that nineteenth-century circumstances are taken into account, to
which much was foreign that today is normal. Election programs
and election promises were novelties that Groen introduced when
almost no-one wanted them. He was also an able political tacti-
cian, although it cannot be denied that he often made decisions at
moments when others were insufficiently prepared for them. For
that matter, his leadership bore a peculiar character. Groen did not
have a political organization at his disposal. To be sure, he did try
to compensate for that lack, for example, with the meetings of the
Christian Friends, the Association for Christian National Primary
Education, and the Confessional Association in the Reformed
Church, and with a never-ending flow of publications—but these
all remained band-aid remedies. His contacts with even the most
prominent representatives of his movement rarely went beyond the
strictly personal level. Groen's leadership was therefore based on
respect for his person and on the personal attachment of his friends
and followers. Leading a somewhat reclusive life, and always very
busy, Groen was not the man who through easy socializing would
try to bind all sorts of people to his person and his positions. Does
that mean that he was far removed from the common run of
people? This complaint does not seem entirely unjust; and yet it
should not be exaggerated. In Groen's day, politics was the
domain of the elite—and not just on account of the limited fran-
chise then in force. This factor must certainly be taken into

account when assessing Groen's record as a politician. Groen may
well have been more in touch with "the masses" than his fellow
parliamentarians; he was not entirely wrong when he claimed to
speak for "the people behind the voters." "Let the liberals extend
the franchise," wrote a defiant J. van Beest van Andel, a grain
dealer from Maastricht who was a prominent member of the local
Secession church and also functioned at times as Groen's political
agent; "especially in the countryside the middle and artisan classes
are anti-revolutionary." Precisely in those plain and homely circles
Groen found a hearing for his political struggles.
Nor should one lose sight of the fact that Groen had to try and
reach the people via publications. He never went on a speaking
tour in order to gain a wide popular following. His arenas were the
Second Chamber and his private study. He got through to the
people by means of open letters To the Voters in which he
explained his principle and his program, in a time when it was not
common for the working classes to subscribe to a newspaper.
Groen reacted to developments in newspaper editorials, broadsides
and brochures, and afterwards he held himself accountable to the
voters by publishing his Parlementaire Adviezen, a selection of his
speeches in the Second Chamber—not exactly reading material for
the common man calculated to reach the tens of thousands. Groen
himself knew that he lacked the talent of writing simple prose for
the general reader. That is exactly why he stimulated other writers,
like Coenraad Mulder, an instructor in the Secession seminary in
Kampen, and especially Abraham Kuyper. This does not mean,
however, that there was no bond between Groen and "ordinary"
people. To be sure, Groen was a dignified man of gentle birth, but
not too dignified on Sundays to slide into the pew next to the
"ordinary" churchgoer. He was as much at ease with carpenters
and schoolteachers as with kings and ministers. Those people also
showed their appreciation for him.
Evaluation 137
High society and common people

In the summer of 1867 Groen paid a visit to the northern prov-
inces. He was met at the train station of Leeuwarden, the provin-
cial capital of Friesland, by a small crowd of people. An observer
wrote to Mrs. Groen: "I think Mr. Groen will have experienced in
Leeuwarden that the hearts of the common people beat warmly for
him. There were no courtly ceremonies, as the big world is in the
habit of offering. No, there was a natural and unadorned cordiality
which can also be shown without fancy words, in a warm hand-
shake and a tear of joy, as I noticed more than once."
What a glaring contrast, also in the eyes of the Groens them-
selves, with all kinds of official gatherings! Their social position
obliged them to be present from time to time at certain receptions
and formal occasions. These they did not enjoy very much, espe-
cially not Mrs. Groen, with her Reformed-puritan bent: in general
she felt that such occasions were "time lost." Groen himself wrote
to De Clercq in 1829: "I need not tell you that to spend many
hours in the noisy and boring circles of society is not my idea of a
good time; nay, I fear that at those Hague teas my face may at
times have borne a sign of boredom which you at least will not
have failed to notice. My dear wife loves those reunions as little
as I do and we avoid them as much as possible." A few years later
Groen confided: "I was terribly bored at those long dinners."
What Willem and Betsy did enjoy was meeting good friends
and acquaintances. During their stay in Paris in 1836, while Groen
and his hired copyists spent many working days in the archives,
they had intensive contact after hours with circles belonging to the
French Réveil. It contributed greatly to getting Mrs. Groen recon-
ciled to her stay in that city—her detestation of the capital city of
the Revolution was very great. "At times I can't believe I am in
Paris, in that city and among those people against which I have
had such strong prejudices since childhood, prejudices that only
grew with the years, so that I left home reluctantly and would
never have come here of my own free will. I was never able to
understand, or abide, how people from our country could go to
Paris for pleasure." In France, and on their way back through
Germany, Groen sat in the visitors' gallery during sessions of
popular assemblies; he also paid visits to all kinds of scholars,
statesmen and princes to talk about subjects of common interest.
In part those were, of course, normal tourist activities; sometimes
they resulted in a correspondence that would last for years.
Naturally, during their stay in Paris they visited the sights and
toured the surroundings. The grounds around the palace of
Versailles, laid out in classicistic style, elicited from Groen the
comparison to "a beautiful women laced in a corset and dressed in
a broad, stiff gown." Apparently he found both very artificial. A
visit to the celebrated Pantheon, where France's famous sons are
buried, gave him occasion to record the following wry reflection:
"As we walked through the underground tunnels a number of
names were pointed out to us, of many of whom it may justly be
said that it is good they are buried here otherwise posterity would
not know they were great men." Similar humorous samples occur
more often. When Van Assen once went on and on about his
preference for English over German, Groen replied mockingly that
he was not so sure English was healthier for the soul than German.
A persistent admonisher
Such sober rebukes were not absent from Groen's contacts with
friends. Sometimes they bore a more serious character. On one
occasion he reminded King William I of the need to observe the
Lord's Day when the latter had announced that he would leave for
a journey on Sunday. Groen for the rest maintained good relations
with some members of the royal family. Whenever a new
publication of his came off the press he would send a copy to
Princess Louise, who was married to the king of Sweden, and to
Prince Frederik, with whom he even exchanged thoughts about
Evaluation 139
political topics from time to time. Groen felt most free to speak his
mind in personal conversations or correspondence, if necessary to
bring differences of opinion to the fore. Then he could be
forthright, without jeopardizing personal relationships and mutual
respect. He rather disliked large gatherings exactly for this reason.
Thus in 1861 he declined a nomination to the Royal Academy of
Sciences. He let Koenen know that interacting with the leading
spokesmen of those of other minds "is not always pleasant when
one is subject to that kind of exposure." One sometimes has to be
a witness in such company, and Groen had discovered about
himself "that in gatherings of that kind my witness at times is
either held back or is paralyzed by the nature of the meeting."
Groen did not lack candour when communicating man-to-man.
A letter to an acquaintance who had defected to Roman Catholi-
cism ended with the words: "wishing you God's blessing, with
sadness and sympathy." When Professor Bake, a haughty liberal
critic before 1848 but since then milder and more conservative,
had become an old man, Groen appealed to him urgently "to
surrender completely to Christ at the eleventh hour." In his own
family Groen was not always followed either. His father worried
about the spiritual development of his son. His brother-in-law
Amshoff was an out-and-out adherent of the Groningen School of
theology; after Groen had read the sermon Amshoff had delivered
on the occasion of the 25 th anniversary of his ordination, he asked
his wife to write the brother-in-law that the sermon "has been
received with thanks. I dare not say much more about it. It is
comely (lief), but alas, Christianly speaking, it is tasteless (laf). It
lacks the salt of the gospel." Groen once described his attitude
toward relations of this kind as follows: "When we differ on
fundamental principles we necessarily grow apart; but avoiding
one another's company for that reason is going too far!"
Groen could be critical not only of outsiders but also of sup-
porters. A fine example of this is his relation with the Secession
Prof. Brummelkamp whom he once referred to with great appre-

ciation as "my opponent, but even more my comrade-in-arms."
Sermons and preaching styles could come in for remarks that
went home: "If only we could be spared for once those long drawn-
out homilies." About the conduct of orthodox Christians he once
remarked: "In our country, orthodoxy dresses itself too often in
unattractive forms and betrays want of Christian wisdom." Groen
did not spare them his criticism, but neither did he allow that to
keep him from defending those same orthodox people when in his
opinion they were being misrepresented. He did this, for example,
in the French-language tract of 1861 that dealt with The Anti-
Revolutionary and Confessional Party in the Reformed Church
of the Netherlands.
A faithful brother
Groen's well-known self-characterization, "Not a statesman, but
a confessor of the gospel," is the key to his public life. In the arena
of politics and in the world of learning Groen was above all a
confessor of Christ. He was an ecumenical Christian. He enjoyed
going to church. How often does his correspondence not mention
that the sermon that Sunday had been "most edifying." He was
involved in the ordinary activities of the local congregation. For
many years he served as an elder in the Walloon church (the
French-language branch of the national church). He performed his
obligations as a member with great care. When the illness that
would be his last had already begun to sap his energy he still want-
ed to go to church that Sunday morning because a vote would be
taken about church affairs that he was concerned about. Groen
was a churchman in the fullest sense of the word. But he was no
narrow-minded sectarian. He looked for what united, not what
divided, preferring to emphasize confessional unity on central
issues and allowing for a variety of views on peripheral matters.
He longed for the unity of the Body of Christ but knew of its
Evaluation 141
brokenness in practice, a brokenness that needed to be overcome

through spiritual oneness. He would go and hear Secession preach-
ers as readily as Reformed ministers: after all, both belonged to the
"Reformed persuasion" which to him constituted a single unit. We
know that he was once denied communion in a Secession church.
He could not agree with such an attitude, but he did not complain
about it nor bear the Seceders a grudge or turn his back on them:
he never stopped visiting their worship services and continued to
give generous sums for their churches and schools.
The Seceders did not spare Groen their criticism in regard to
church and school. For instance, Groen' s Association for Christian
National Primary Education had its counterpart in their Associa-
tion for Reformed Elementary Education. Nevertheless, they re-
mained grateful to Groen and recognized him as a brother in the
faith. The question has sometimes been raised whether Groen
would have gone along with the separation from the national
church that took place ten years after his death, the so-called
Doleantie. One can only speculate. Some people are convinced he
would have joined. To be sure, it cannot be denied that by endors-
ing Kuyper's activity after 1868 Groen embarked on a course that
would lead to the breach of 1886. Yet Groen himself acknowl-
edged that he was uncertain where developments would lead in the
future. One reason why some people keep raising the question is
to justify their own choice of denomination, in total disregard of
the changed situation. In any event, Groen's aim was vital: it was
to restore the Reformed Church in the Netherlands.
Throughout, Groen was respectful of and grateful for sincere
convictions held by people with whom he otherwise differed pro-
foundly. Typical is a musing that he wrote down after visiting a
hospital for the poor that was run by Catholic nuns. He could only
praise their sacrificial show of love. "Is it from love of Christ, or
to earn salvation? Neither the one nor the other can be discounted,
especially not the first. While the Roman church persists in many
errors, there is many a happy inconsistency in their practical

application. The tree is known by its fruits."
Stewards and benefactors

The Groens lived simply. To relieve their household staff on
Sundays they took sandwiches with them which they ate between
services in the consistory room of the village church. Every day
Mrs. Groen led in devotions with the maids. Groen surrendered his
manorial rights in the village of Ursem in 1850, after having given
the villagers a considerable reduction in monetary dues eight years
earlier. Mrs. Groen especially felt weighed down by the duty to be
good stewards of the properties entrusted to them. When they had
moved into the splendid house on the Korte Vijverberg, inherited
from Groen's father, she sighed, "May my heart not grow attached
to it."
The Groens spent much time and money on charity. Mrs.
Groen led a sewing circle for girls from the lower classes; she
maintained a school for pauper children; and every year on her
birthday a new cottage was opened where a poor working-class
family could come and live. Husband and wife gave liberally to all
in need.
Elout van Soeterwoude once recalled how gratitude would fill
the hearts and eyes of the neighbourhood poor as they passed the
home of the Grows. If ever there should be a bread riot, they had
assured Elout, the house of Groen will be spared. So numerous
were the requests for fmancial assistance during the last years of
Groen's life that he had to cut back. Countless churches, school
associations and philanthropic institutions appealed to his purse.
Da Costa, and later his widow, were supported financially by
Groen and by a number of others, but Groen was also willing to
make a contribution toward paying off the debts of the liberal his-
torian Bakhuizen van den Brink. Groen subscribed for three thou-
sand guilders toward the start-up capital for Kuyper's paper De
Evaluation 143
Standaard. And on it goes; it would take many pages to list the

generosity of the Groens.
Was Groen van Prinsterer a conservative?

Was Groen, a man who accepted smallpox vaccination and regu-
larly enjoyed recreation on the beaches of Scheveningen—was this
man a conservative? Was he a traditionalist, history-minded to a
fault, a static thinker? Did he favour a type of feudal society with
aristocratic values? Was he a representative of organological
thought? Was he an intolerant champion of a long outdated theo-
cratic Calvinism? Did he hold to an unscholarly bias, nurture old-
fashioned prejudices? Was he an impractical, ivory-tower scholar
with his head in the clouds, living in a Romantic dream world pop-
ulated by heroes from the past, like the princes of Orange and the
Calvinists? — Many have depicted Groen as more or less repre-
senting this brand of ideological conservatism. The evidence is
supposed to be found in his writings.
Now it is true that Groen often cites with approval—certainly
in a book like Unbelief and Revolution—authors like Burke,
Haller, Lamennais, and others. He enjoyed invoking defenders of
things like the value of history, organic growth and development,
and so on.
Nevertheless, we question the custom of some people to lump
Groen van Prinsterer with the conservatives. We do not now mean
`conservative' in the hollowed-out sense resulting from sloppy
speech, which applies the label to anything from a personal prefer-
ence for established ways to a reactionary stance in public affairs
that can at most accept gradual reform but resists drastic change.
In general, Groen is also called a conservative on account espe-
cially of certain views in his earlier writings. This reading of him
ignores Groen's conduct in practice and the evolution of his stand-
points over the years. Granted, it is not difficult to draw from, say
Unbelief and Revolution, a number of very conservative terms and
concepts of Restoration vintage. Groen never officially retracted

these. On the contrary, he always declared proudly that throughout
his life (after his conversion) he had consistently held the same
views. In broad outline that is correct. But in an understandable
desire to remain true to himself Groen was neglecting nuances and
shifts that are of such crucial importance for making a balanced
assessment. In the years 1846/47 Groen was suffused with a good
deal of Romanticism; in later years much less of that is present and
the number of his citations from Romantic-conservative authors
declined. For that matter, Groen always referred to himself as an
anti-revolutionary because he judged counter-revolutionary to be
too static, too conservative. The key for Groen was not the ques-
tion of preservation or renewal, but whether the preservation or the
renewal would contribute to the advancement of the gospel. In this
way he tried to wrestle free from the conservative/progressive
dilemma. Indeed, what a serious misrepresentation of reality it
would be to characterize Groen's life-long struggle in church and
state as a defence of the status quo!
It is true, however, that where unimportant or unclear matters
were concerned, Groen, owing to his background and upbringing,
sided more often with the forces of conservation than with the
voices for change. In an earlier chapter we pointed out that in
Liberty, Equality, Fraternity he seemed to favour a society divided
along social classes. A shoemaker could not in his eyes be a good
lawmaker. That is certainly an unmistakable expression of Groen's
19th-century conservatism. But in contrast to that theory there was
his practice. He never opposed broadening the franchise, extending
public education, promoting social and economic welfare at home
and in the colonies. On the contrary, one cannot forget his indom-
itable battle for the abolition of slavery, for prison reform, for all
kinds of Christian social action. Reverend Heldring was one of his
warmest supporters for a reason!
Evaluation 145
In his political philosophy Groen was a conservative. He looked

upon democracy as demoncracy: popular rule easily becomes de-
monic rule. Caught up in a fierce battle with liberalism which bore
popular sovereignty in its banner, he rejected everything that might
at all resemble it. In this, his penchant for abstract, strictly logical
argument played him tricks. But that is a long way from advoca-
ting state absolutism! Groen did not foresee how participatory gov-
ernment, with responsibilities for the common man, would invigor-
ate a nation. But all this did not prevent him from taking his place
among the founders of the Dutch system of responsible govern-
ment and among the champions of the rights of parliament.
This last point was clearly demonstrated by his stance with
respect to the Keuchenius motion. One can also think of his prac-
tical stance toward the liberal constitution of 1848. For the longest
time, conservatives of every stripe brooded on undoing their defeat
of 1848 and recovering their lost influence. Liberals meanwhile,
both moderate and progressive, carefully guarded their victory of
1848. Both sides closely watched what Groen would do. Groen de-
cided that he should try and contribute positively to the new consti-
tutional arrangements by helping to develop them in harmony with
Christian principles and national traditions. Thus, though he objec-
ted to the spirit of 1848 he accepted the factual situation. For
example, during the heated debates in 1856 over public education,
the King sought Groen's advice about revising the constitution in
a more conservative spirit. Groen replied that the Crown must
avoid appearing to be reactionary; the current system, though open
to improvements here and there, should not be overhauled again.
He further advised that any thoughts of curtailing the press and
restricting the franchise should be forthwith abandoned.
Groen's break with the conservatives

Of the greatest importance in Groen's life is his break with the
conservatives of his day. The foregoing chapters have indicated
how this break had become inevitable, given certain unmistakable

developments in Groen's thinking and especially in his conduct.
His concrete stance in numerous factual situations is an important
factor—as yet examined too little—for drawing a complete picture
of Groen's personality and determining his full historical sig-
nificance, which cannot be characterized simply as conservative.
He neither wanted to be a conservative nor ever became one.
Groen van Prinsterer should be evaluated in light of both his words
and his deeds, in the context of his own time and place. What holds
for all historical figures also holds for Groen: he thought and acted
in an era that is past, and under circumstances which no longer
exist. The world of thought and action has thoroughly altered in
the past century. The Netherlands, which occupies a different
place in a different world than 150 years ago, is today a demo-
cracy in which everyone has the right to vote and in which the
distribution of power, knowledge and property has increased to a
degree unimaginable to a man from the nineteenth century.
Orthodox Protestants have regained their place in the public
square, the situation in the church has altered completely, the
liberals of old have vanished, the changes in intellectual and
religious life are as great and numerous as the transformations in
society and the economy.
Confessor of the gospel and therefore a statesman

But are the central themes of Groen's message and the goals of his
public career, wrapped up in all those old issues and antiquated
problems, also old and antiquated? Groen was a statesman who in
a time of increasing dechristianization confronted the people of his
country with the gospel. He offered a penetrating critique of socie-
ty and pointed to the destructive consequences of secularism and
a me-first attitude, of views of man and society that proceed from
bad starting-points and therefore can have only bad outcomes.
Evaluation 147
He also pointed a way out of the misery that self-reliant

mankind easily brings down upon itself: Turn to faith and accept
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which holds out salvation for individ-
uals and communities. This faith, Groen van Prinsterer confessed,
has been given for an "inestimable blessing" both for the life that
now is and for the life that is to come.
THE END
For Further Reading
The literature on which this biography is based is vast. Publications by
Groen van Prinsterer himself number over 150. Publications about
Groen are even more numerous. Almost all of them, however, are in
the Dutch language. We shall first enumerate the chiefworks consulted
for this book, and then list some useful titles in English and French.
Primary sources
The present biography is based extensively, next to Groen's own
writings, on the volumes of his published correspondence. The corres-
pondence not only reflects the many fields in which he was active and
the many people he was in contact with, but it also provides much
insight into the mind and character of the man. Groen's correspon-
dence has been published in six large volumes of Briefwisseling in the
Great Series of the Rijks Geschiedkundige Publication (National
Historical Publications), as follows:
Briefwisseling 1: 1808-1833 Edited by C. Gerretson.

Pp. xxxii, 912. The Hague, 1925.
Briefwisseling II: 1833-1848. Edited by C. Gerretson and J. L. van
Essen. Pp. xvi, 1012. The Hague, 1964.
Briefwisseling III: 1848-1866. Edited by H. J. Smit.
Pp. xxviii, 1004. The Hague, 1949.
Briefwisseling IV: 1866-1876. Edited by A. Goslinga and J. L. van
Essen. Pp. xxiv, 964. The Hague, 1967.
These four hefty tomes have been supplemented by two more volumes
of correspondence:
Briefwisseling V: 1827-1869. Edited by J. L. van Essen.

Pp. x, 903. The Hague, 1980.
Briefwisseling VI: 1869-1876. Edited by J. L. van Essen.

Pp. x, 809. The Hague, 1992.
All told, these volumes amount to nearly 6 000 pages.
Seeded into Vols. V and VI are the letters (now critically edited)
that passed between G. Groen van Prinsterer and Abraham Kuyper and
were brought out by Kok, Kampen as a "pre-publication" in a separate
volume on the centennial of Kuyper' s birth in 1937. That single volume
is now obsolete, at least for scholarly purposes.
In addition to his correspondence, Groen's literary remains have
been published as well:
Bescheiden I. 1821-1842. Edited by J. Zwaan. Pp. xv, 714.

The Hague, 1990.
Bescheiden II: 1842-1876. Edited by J. Zwaan. Pp. 835.
The Hague, 1991.
These volumes contain copiously annotated editions of previously un-

published essays, memos, drafts, etc., some of which are in French.
Available on the Internet: http://www.inghist.nl/Onderzoek/Projecten/
BrievenEnBescheidenG.GroenVanPrinsterer1821-1876
Secondary sources
The original Dutch edition of this book contained a Bibliographic Essay
and a List of Works Cited covering sixteen pages. With few exceptions,
the items listed there are written in Dutch and their titles will not be
reproduced here.
Indicative of scholars' interest in Green as an historical figure, 14
doctoral dissertations have thus far been devoted to aspects of Groen
van Prinsterer's life and thought. In chronological order they are:
1860: D. Koorders, about constitutional law according to Groen

1905: M. P. Th. a Th. van der Hoop van Slochteren, about Groen on
church and state
1907: F. J. Fokkema, on Groen's platonizing philosophy
For Further Reading 151
1925: C. Tazelaar, about Groen's formative years

1931: J. A. H. J. S. Bruins Slot, about Groen's response to the no-po-
pery movement of 1853
1933: G. M. den Hartogh, about Groen's conduct during the election
campaign of 1871
1940: H. Smitskamp, on Groen van Prinsterer as historian
1943: I. A. Diepenhorst (at 21-61), on Groen and the theory of the
Christian state
1948: J. D. Dengerink (at 69-95), on Groen and the development ofthe
doctrine of sphere-sovereignty
1949: G. J. Laman, on Groen as a member of parliament, 1862-65
1951: J. L. P. Brants, on Groen's spiritual growth up to his conversion
1973: J. Zwaan, on Groen van Prinsterer as a classicist
1989: A. J. van Dijk, on Groen's lectures on Unbelief and Revolution
1993: J. W. Kirpenstein, about Groen on church and state
English-language publications about Groen van Prinsterer

Essen, J. L. van. "Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer and His Conception
of History." Westminster Theological Journal 44 (1982): 205-49.
Essen, J. L. van, and Morton, H. Donald. Guillaume Groen van Prin-
sterer: Selected Studies. Jordan Station, ON: Wedge, 1990. This
collection contains the title mentioned immediately above, plus
three other essays on Groen's struggle for Christian education as
well as a special essay on Groen's prose style.
Hospers, Sr., G. H. "Groen van Prinsterer and His Book." Evangelical
Quarterly 7 (1935): 267-86.
Klapwijk, Jacob. "Calvin and Neo-Calvinism on Non-Christian Phi-
losophy." Philosophia Reformata 38 (1973): 43-61, at 49-51.
Langley, McKendree R. "Pioneers of Christian Politics I." Vanguard
(April 1971): 7-9.
What Does It Mean to Be a Christian in the World?" The
Presbyterian Guardian (Jan. 1976): 8 13.
-
"The Witness of a World View." Pro Rege 8.2 (1979): 2-11.

"The Legacy of Groen van Prinsterer." Reformed Perspective
(Jan. 1985): 25-28.
Lloyd Jones, D. Martyn. "The French Revolution and After." In The

-
Christian and the State in Revolutionary Times. London: West-

minster Conference, 1975. Pp. 94-99.
Pall Mall Gazette, 27 April 1867, pp. 4ff. discusses the implications for
Europe's international relations of the first of Groen's pamphlets
of 1867, La Prusse et les Pays Bas.
-
Paul, Herman. Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer: A Critical Reapprai-

sal." Fides et Historia 36.2 (2004): 67-82.
Runner, H. Evan. Scriptural Religion and Political Task. Toronto:
Wedge, 1974. Pp. 89 99.
-
Sap, John W. Paving the Way for Revolution: Calvinism and the
Struggle for a Democratic Constitutional State. Amsterdam: VU
Uitgeverij, 2001. Pp. 289-302.
Summaries in dissertations: found in the studies listed above by Brants,
Dengerink, Kirpestein and Zwaan.
Sap, John W. Paving the Way for Revolution: Calvinism and the
Struggle for a Democratic Constitutional State. Amsterdam: VU
Uitgeverij, 2001. Pp. 289 345
-
Taylor, E. L. Hebden. The Christian Philosophy of Law, Politics and

the State. N.d. Pp. 18 42,238.
-
Van Dyke, Harry. Groen van Prinsterer's Lectures on Unbelief and

Revolution. Jordan Station, ON: Wedge, 1989. Contains a trans-
lation (abridged) of Unbelief and Revolution at pp. 293-539.
Zylstra, Bernard. "Voegelin on Unbelief and Revolution." Antirevolu-
tionaire Staatkunde 46 (1976): 155-65. Reprinted in C. Bremmer
and M. G. Kool, eds., Een Staatsman ter navolging: Groen van
Prinsterer herdacht (1876-1976). The Hague, 1976. Pp. 191 200.
-
Publications by Groen in French

"Prolégomènes." In Archives ou correspondance inédite de la maison
d'Orange Nassau. Series I: 9 vols.; Leyden, 1835-47; Series II: 5
-
vols.; Utrecht, 1857-61.

La Prusse et les Pays-Bas; a mes amis de Berlin. Amsterdam, 1867.
L 'Empire prussien et l'Apocalypse; a mes amis de Berlin. Amsterdam,
1867.
For Further Reading 153
Le parti anti-révolutionnaire et confesionnel clans l 'Eglise Reform&

des Pays-Bas. Etude d'histoire contemporaine. Amsterdam, 1860.
La Hollande et l'influence de Calvin. Amsterdam, 1864.
La nationalité religieuse en rapport avec la Hollande et l 'Alliance
Evangélique. Amsterdam, 1867. Reprinted in M. Cohen Stuart
(see below), 47-51.
Maurice et Barnevelt. Etude historique. Utrecht, 1875.
Publications about Groen in French

Reville, Albert. "Monsieur G. Groen van Prinsterer." Revue des Deux
Mondes 46 (1876): 478-80.
Stuart, M. Cohen. In memoriam Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer:
Notice biographique. Utrecht, 1876.
Van Dyke, Harry. "Conferences de Groen van Prinsterer sur
Gl'Irnocerné-vdauiPtiestaR'von(ésm)."I
Lectures (see above), 277-84.
Versluys, J. C. "Lamennais et Groen van Prinsterer." Neophilologus
17 (1932): 8-17.

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Groen van Prinsterer: His Life and Work

The text of this translation is based on my book of 1976 entitled Mr.

Napoleon, and after 1813 to King William I. Dr. Groen—the

their French "brothers" and so they were lowered to the status of

daughter, Mimi (Maria Clazina), born in 1806, stayed home a

This paternal care extended to the minutest details and accord-

In 1815 Dr. Groen sent his son to Utrecht, to the Hieronymus

Student years in Leyden

students as well as with his professors. Relations between pro-

Self-confidence, concord, reasonableness: these were the key

minded son, accompanied by a group of friends, would surely be

eighteenth-century historian Jan Wagenaar were beside the mark:

say it. The most sensational instance was the appearance in

was enrolled in. Meanwhile, he was a close witness of the mount-

Groen's defence, according to another witness, was far above the

of that father Groen was convinced. First, however, the young

Courtship and marriage

decades of the nineteenth century that began in Geneva and spread

On the 21' of May in the year 1828, in the City Hall of

Groen's spiritual growth

I had the privilege of receiving a very religious upbringing,

This testimony of Groen about himself is confirmed by many other

Still, Groen van Prinsterer was a seeker. Perhaps he didn't

August 1830, Groen's condemnation was vehement. Immediately

the differences in national character of both sections. That funda-

More and more Groen began to recognize the true nature of

a thousand things have become clear to me which I had

Half a year later Groen confided to De Clercq: "I wish I could

In the Nursery of History

he letter of 1833 in which the King gave his secretary an

would edit 13 volumes in all, covering the period 1552 to 1688.

airing. For Groen wanted to go back to the oldest possible sources.

Groen's view of history

surprisingly modern standpoints on all sorts of practical questions.

the first instalment of his Handbook of the History of the Father-

conclusions or superficial judgments. "I declare with confidence

the Netherlands followed upon the confession of the Gospel, its

without much difficulty. How is one to know, for example, what

Lectures on unbelief and revolution

during the summer of 1845, when he was composing the final

Another reason why Unbelief and Revolution is not Groen's

An anti revolutionary worldview

The principal ideas of Groen's Christian-historical (also called

subsequently not exercise in the name of liberty and equality?

The latter is actually the case in the Netherlands, Groen reminded

Given these theories, Groen argues, one need not be surprised

been grossly overrated. A close reading of Groen's historical

Battling the Spirit of the Age

Groen and the Secession of 1834

favourable. At least, in January of 1834 he wrote to Willem de

Those harmful consequences were not long in coming, at least

In defence of the Seceders

subjected the government measures against the Seceders to a kind

put in jeopardy. In signing the form, ministers now declared in

tion must be judged inadequate and ineffective: compulsion only

Groen and Thorbecke

Groen' s. Thorbecke read the Measures Against the Seceders while

of former days, and what ties remained were based on recognition