Alpha Book

Both in administering his extensive
dominions and in dealing with foreign foes, Charles was a zealous,
hard-working, and calculating prince, and the lack of success which
attended many of his projects was due not to want of ability in the
ruler but to the multiplicity of interests among the ruled. The emperor
must do too many things to allow of his doing any one thing well.
[Sidenote: Difficulties Confronting Charles]
Suppose we turn over in our minds some of the chief problems of Charles
V, for they will serve to explain much of the political history of the
sixteenth century. In the first place, the emperor was confronted with
extraordinary difficulties in governing his territories. Each one of
the seventeen provinces of the Netherlands--the country which he always
considered peculiarly his own--was a distinct political unit, for there
existed only the rudiments of a central administration and a common
representative system, while the county of Burgundy had a separate
political organization.


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