St. Louis Piety

King Louis XIV was very egotistic. Lisa Hilton explains, “he was of the opinion that he was pretty much a god himself.” He only dressed in the finest fabrics and was very conscious of his appearance. Fashion was of great importance to him. He started wearing a wig when his hair line started to recede. To make himself appear taller, he wore high heeled shoes. He ritualized his daily activities. Nobles would stand in line to help him get dressed, watch him eat, and help him get ready for

Louis XIV and Peter the Great were two of the most famous absolutism monarchs in Europe. In my point of view Louis XIV did a better job as a leader. In the 17th century the Europe world entered the age of absolutism. After the religious wars, most European people put their attentions back from the wars and more focused on their own life. At that time, nobles and kings of European countries get more power in managing people. And monarchs’ power and rights reached to the top stage as they claimed to rule by divine will.

     In addition to his strengths, Louis XIV had weaknesses. After Colbert died, Louis made one mistake that undid all of his work. He revoked Edict of Nantes who protected the religious freedom of the Huguenots. Instead of being imprisoned, more than 200,000 Huguenots fled from France. The country lost many of its skilled workers and business leaders. Louis XIV also fought many costly wars that caused his people great suffering. Many of the wars left France on the brink of bankruptcy.

Louis XIV was successful in achieving “one king, one law, one faith.” He was able to

King Louis XVI loved his country, even if it was in ruins which he was trying to fix, and even though unfortunately he was not the strongest ruler that does not mean King Louis XVI committed treason against France. He was wrongly persecuted for something he did not commit, treason is the crime of trying to overthrow your country's government or of helping your country's enemies during war, not fleeing from an unsafe home. King Louis XVI was innocent of treason because he actively tried to fix problems in the country, even though sometimes the outcomes of his solutions weren't perfect. He was a significant monarch with the way he affected the French Revolution as a

Of all the absolute rulers in Europe, by far the best example of one, and the most powerful, was Louis XIV of France. Although Louis had some failures, he also had many successes. He controlled France’s money and had many different ways to get, as well as keep his power, and he knew how to delegate jobs to smart, but loyal people.

The fact that Louis grew up in a time of civil war in France, where he saw the negative affects poor leadership and too much power to the lords can do probably influenced the way he saw power. His view was that the king should have all the power, and that committees and subcommittees should report to him, like intendants, as we can see in a piece written by James E. King concerning Louis XIV (Doc 1). This source is reliable, because the author of it has no bias while writing it, showing only the facts and the manner in which the kingdom and country was run. Louis made the nobles and lords depend on hi m for any amount of power, and weakened them by giving more rights to the commoners, which undermined their power.

Louis XIV was a very generous spender. He put in large amounts of money to finance the royal court, and operated as a supporter of the arts, funding literary and cultural figures. He also kept his army in mind by building military complex known as the Hôtel des Invalides to give a home for officers and soldiers who had served him loyally in the army. The Hôtel des Invalides established new treatments frequently and set a new standard for the rather barbarous hospice treatment styles of the period. To support a Machiavellian tactic, Louis XIV didn?t have any mercenaries or auxiliaries, he controlled his own army, and was a self-sufficient ruler that didn?t rely on the help of others in battle.

By this time most of the crusaders had left to go home, and those who remained ad built four settlements. The purpose of these four settlements were to guard and govern conquered territory. These Crusader states were Jerusalem, Edessa, Antioch and Tripoli. However, the Muslim forces began gaining ground around 1130, and in 1144 Zangi who was the Seljuk general captured Edessa (northern Crusader states. By this time Pope Eugene III called for a second crusade, his call was answered by King Louis VIII and his wife Eleanor. Louis was a very religious man and he wanted to honor the first crusaders and his goal was to take the cross and expand the Crusader kingdoms. Unfortunately, Louis had very little military experience, but he still set out with more than 30,000 crusaders to recapture the holy land. This journey took five months because they traveled through France to Asia Minor. This wasn’t a good strategy because by doing this they would pass through Turkish lands and therefore put themselves in danger. The Turks took advantage of this situation by attacking Louis’s group (there were two groups traveling). Louis and his wife were able to survive but there were thousands of crusaders that were killed. Louis decided that best approach would be to abandon his army to look for a new route. His original route was Edessa but he took the way of Damascus (Palestine) because it was closer to Jerusalem. Nur Al-Din who was the son of Zangi (Turkish General), went to unite all of the Muslims in preparation for the war. Even though Nur Al-Din was determined to take back Jerusalem it was Louis who made the first move in 1148. Nur Al-Din had a choice to take Damascus and if he did so he would have more power, (Aleppo and Damascus were the eastern part of the Crusader states. The results of the battle was that there were thousands of Muslims that were dead, the Damascus ruler begged Nur Al-Din to send his army. Louis had to make a

How can one separate a mere normal man from a king? And which is more important between men with a passion from a man with a selfish desire? King Louis XVI was an example of a king unfit to rule. We will discuss King Louis’s early life, his reign as king, and the role he played in the French revolution.

Oddly, he doesn’t discuss any other good rulers from history rather; he only cites biblical leaders as his other primary examples of good rulers. This proves rather odd because in other works such as his Diadema Monachorum, he uses examples of historical rulers taken from Cassiodorus’s Tripartite History and Augustine’s History. Laistner argues that because of the language presented in the Via Regia it had to have been written for Louis. “There is an exhortation to the king to remedy abuses in the Church, which gains greatly in point if read in light of Benedict of Aniane’s zeal for reform and of the interested in, and support of, Benedict’s policy that Louis had shown from early manhood.” This was one of the most essential parts of

the traits of a “good king”. He was a warrior with extraordinary abilities which made him seem

Some people think that King Louis XIV did more harm to France than good. They cite his lack of moderation in managing his money. They also point out that Louis denied religious liberties to the Protestants of France and tightened control over his Roman Catholic subjects by revoking the Edict of Nantes. They also claim Louis’ war efforts were very costly and drained the treasury of France. Some say his arrogance, including his emblem of the “Sun King”, turned “his” people away from him. They think that Louis only cared about himself and what he wanted and didn’t think about future France.

After being ruled by a prime minister for so long, France needed some changes. That is exactly what Louis the XIV would bring to France. In an age of separation, Louis wanted to start a unification process. He started this by giving himself sole power and also only having one religion for the country. The king is always the center of attention good or bad. Louis was prepared to take the good with the bad, and handled it well. He emphasized the king as the center of attention. While some see him as egotistical and greedy, Louis was one king who knew how to make improvements.

the 10th Louis was now named Louis XVI, because of his grandfather’s death. A great and honorable king was what Louis wanted to become. But his tutors kind of knew that he was childish and didn’t have enough confidence that he needed to be a great king. During Louis reign his interest was more on religious and policies. But when it comes to serious problems and crisis Louis Augusta wasn’t man enough to handle it. Self-sufficient power of his character and decisions to gain the influence with court factions or given support with reforms and their efforts to make France’s government better. Louis Augusta early policy achievement was able to support with the American colonies fight for independence. Louie’s reign