Body, parentage and character in history : notes on the Tudor period / by Furneaux Jordan.

  • Jordan, Furneaux.
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Body, parentage and character in history : notes on the Tudor period / by Furneaux Jordan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    58/102 (page 44)
    fire if circumstance is adverse. One day they burn, tlie next day they are burnt. The feature in Henry^s character which as we have seen amounted to mania was his love of popularity; it was a mania which saved him from many evils. Even unbridled self-will does little harm if it be an unbridled self-will to stand well with a progressive people. It has been a matter of surprise to those who contend that Henry, seeing that he possessed—it is said usurped—a lion^s power, did not use it with lion- like licence. His ingrained love of applause is the physiological explanation. Let it be noted, too, that not everyone who thirsts for popularity succeeds in obtaining it, for success demands several factors: behind popular applause there must be action, behind action must be self-confidence, behind self-confidence must be large capability. Henry had all these. In such a chain love of applause is the link least likely to be missing. For, indeed, what is the use of being active, capable, confident and important in a closet ? The crow sings as sweetly as the nightingale if no one is listening, and importance is no better than insig- nificance if there is no one '' there to see.^^ We shall gain further and not uninteresting know- ledge of Henry^s character if we look at certain side lights which history throws upon it. We turn there- fore, in another note, to look for a few moments at the men, the movements, the drift, the institutions of his time, and observe how he bore himself towards them.