Dissertation_A Bick_May 25 - DataSpace at Princeton University

author offered a framework of several categories and nominal values, each complete with blank
lines in the text that could be filled in to arrive at complete calculations. At one point in the text,
the author explained that he
hoped that one or another lover of the Company will take the trouble to resume, amplify, and
correct this calculation, and to arrange all the figures in terms of money, which may be done by
someone who has greater familiarity [than I do] with [the costs] of equipment in Spain. 105
The many figures that the author of the Kort Discours did provide were broken into three
categories: extra costs incurred by the Spanish King, lost income, and damage to ships, goods,
and property. Although these categories match De Laet’s, the author calculated many of his
estimates in tonnes of gold, rather than guilders, and included a plethora of examples from the
late 1630s and early 1640s that cannot be found in De Laet’s text. In addition, whereas the Twee
Deductien and two other 1644 pamphlets concerning the WIC were all published by Jan Velli, a
bookseller in The Hague known for his offerings of pamphlets and newspapers, the Kort
Discours listed no publisher. 106 We can only guess that its author was a merchant involved in
some way in the company’s activities, though at a greater distance from its inner circles. Even at
this remove, however, he recognized the advantages of buttressing his arguments with numbers.
In this sense, De Laet’s work takes on significance not only for its novelty but as part of a
more general trend in which quantification became central to Dutch political and commercial
rhetoric. At least among the documents related to the WIC, systematic attempts at quantification
105 Ibid., 4. “Dan omme evenwl dit soo nae ende duydelijck mogelijck voor te stellen, ende hier ter plaetse vast te
maeken, dat desen staet niet soo simpelijck eenighe diensten: maer een Extra-ordinarie groote verlichtinghe by, ende
wegen de voorsz. Compagnie, heeft genoten, sullen hier onder in ‘t korte aenwijsen, waer inne de voorsz. lasten.
verliesen en schade van de Koninck van Spanjen voor het meesten-deel, ende so veel wy die hebben konnen
bedencken, bestaan, sonder nochtans daer achter eenige somme uyt te trecken, om geen mis-slagen te begaen, hoe
wel ‘t selve sonderlingh ‘t onser intentie soude dienen; dan willen verhoopen dat d’een of ander Liefhebber de
voorsz. hier onderstaende Calculatie ofte overslach siende, de moeyte sal nemen deselve te resumeren, amplieren, of
corrigeren, ende met eenen alles in ghelde brenghen, gelijck dat by sommige (kennisse hebbende van Equipagien
van Spanjen) heel lichtelick sal konnen werden ghedaen.”
106 Keblusek, Boeken in de Hofstad, 118–121.
255