The youthful Henry VIII was optimistic, congenial, wonderful and liberal by all accounts. He was also edgy and emotional. He was educated in the finest schools and by the finest tutors England had to offer. Erasmus called him a " world-wide genius," and Henry VIII was schooled in academics as well as theology, music, art, and the gentlemanly sports like wrestling, horse racing, hunting and others. Henry VIII loved music, even composing his own tune, Greensleeves, a melodic phrase that is still popular with contemporary audiences. Henry's education and his well-rounded abilities and pursuits were attribute of the burgeoning conversion. Henry VIII represented the ideal of all that the Renaissance collective.
As Weir maintains, "He embodied the Renaissance ideal of the man of many talents with the qualities of the chivalric heroes whom he so much admired." Such a combination of qualities skill easily lend itself to acting as a token of the transition from the Medieval to the Renaissance periods in history. In Henry VIII's later years, the King would be plagued by ill-health, worn from battles that did micro to change the balance of power in Europe, and his battles with the Catholic church service and other woes turned him into a conflicted and doubting individual.
As Weir argues, Henry VIII changed in personality and temperament from his youthful long time on the thr ane to those of the final two decades of his reign, "Only as he grew older did the suspicious and crafty streaks in his disposition become more pronounced; nor were his willfulness, arrogance, ruthlessness, selfishness, and brutality yet apparent, for they were draped by an irresistible charm and affable manner." Henry's search for an heritor and his conflict with the Roman Catholic church everywhere divorcement caused him to have Thomas More beheaded as well as breaking from the Catholic church's authority. The reformation by Henry VIII that resulted in the origination of the Anglican church was one of the most tumultuous and significant, if dubious, triumphs of his reign. Weir maintains that Henry would often waffle over complex decisions like his break with the church, but his belief that he was ruling by Divine Right made him soaked once he arrived at a decision: " one time his mind was made up he always judged himself, as the Lord's Anointed, to be in the right."
Weir, A. Henry VIII: The King and His Court. virgin York, NY: Ballantine Books, 2001.
No discussion of Henry VIII's life would be drop without mentioning his marriage woes. Henry's first wife was also his longest, Catherine of Aragon, a princess of Spain and young woman of
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