Bust of Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer (1801-1876)

Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer (1801 - 1876), statesman and historian. Plaster. Th. C. Simons, 1876. Groen van Prinsterer is seen by some as the spiritual father of the Christian-historical or anti-revolutionary movement in Dutch politics. He believed that through its history Holland had become a Protestant nation, moulded by the struggle of Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries against the Catholic king of Spain. He rejected the godless principles of the French Revolution which had made man and not God the centre. Groen van Prinsterer entered parliament in 1840, the same year as Thorbecke. He remained, with a short break, until 1866. The plaster bust was presented in 1886 by Queen Emma to the Rijksmuseum, newly opened in 1885.