a bloated tyrant, any more than Queen Elizabeth (though the fact is
not generally known) was born a wizened old woman. He was from
youth, till he was long past his grand climacteric, a very handsome,
powerful, and active man, temperate in his habits, good-humoured,
frank and honest in his speech (as even his enemies are forced to
confess). He seems to have been (as his portraits prove
sufficiently), for good and for evil, a thorough John Bull; a
thorough Englishman: but one of the very highest type.


'Had he died (says Mr. Froude) previous to the first agitation of the
divorce, his loss would have been deplored as one of the heaviest
misfortunes which had ever befallen this country, and he would have
left a name which would have taken its place in history by the side
of the Black Prince or the Conqueror of Agincourt. Left at the most
trying age, with his character unformed, with the means of gratifying
every inclination, and married by his ministers, when a boy, to an
unattractive woman far his senior, he had lived for thirty-six years
almost without blame, and bore through England the reputation of an
upright and virtuous king. Nature had been prodigal to him of her
rarest gifts . . . Of his intellectual ability we are not left to
judge from the suspicious panegyrics of his contemporaries. His
State Papers and letters may be placed by the side of those of Wolsey
or of Cromwell, and they lose nothing by the comparison. Though they
are broadly different, the perception is equally clear, the
expression equally powerful; and they breathe throughout an
irresistible vigour of purpose. In addition to this, he had a fine
musical taste, carefully cultivated; he spoke and wrote in four
languages; and his knowledge of a multitude of subjects, with which
his versatile ability made him conversant, would have formed the