John was the first sovereign who had styled himself, on his great
seal, "King of England,"[1] thus formally claiming the actual
ownership of the realm. He was now to find that the sovereign who has
no place in his subjects' hearts has small hold of their possessions.
[1] The late Professor E. A. Freeman, in his "Norman Conquest," I, 85,
note, says that though Richard Coeur de Lion had used this title in
issuing charters, yet John was the first king who put this inscription
on the great seal.
The rest of his ignominious reign was spent in war against the barons
and Prince Louis of France. "They have placed twenty-five kings over
me!" he shouted, in his fury, referring to the twenty-five leading men
who had been appointed to see that the Great Charter did not become a
dead letter. But the twenty-five did their duty, and the war was on.
In the midst of it John suddenly died. The old record said of
him--and said rightly--that he was "a knight without truth, a king
without justice, a Christian without faith."[2] The Church returned
good for evil, and permitted him to be buried in front of the high
altar of Worcester cathedral.
[2] The late Professor W. Stubbs, of Oxford, says, in his "Early
Plantagenets," p. 152: "John ended thus a life of ignominy in which he
has no rival in the whole long list of our sovereigns....He was in
every way the worst of the whole list: the most vicious, the most
profane, the most tyrannical, the most false, the most short-sighted,
the most unscrupulous." A more recent writer (Professor Charles Oman,
of the University of Oxford), says of John, "No man had a good word to
say for him...; he was loathed by every one who knew him."