He held the Catholic faith, he was not naturally cruel, and, compared with Francis I., or with Henry of Navarre, he was not licentious.

But he was brought up to believe that the ordinary rules of morality do not govern kings.
That the king can do no wrong is now a maxim of the Constitution, and merely means that Ministers are responsible for the acts of the Crown.

Henry could scarcely have been made to understand, even if there had been any one to tell him, what a constitutional monarch was.

Though forced to admit, and taught by experience, that he could not safely tax his subjects without the formal sanction of Parliament, he was in theory absolute, and he held it his duty to rule as well as to reign.

When Charles I.argued, a century later, that a king was not bound to keep faith with his subjects, it may be doubted whether he deceived himself.