He
tyrannized over even his mistresses.
Philip II., the greatest monarch of modern times,--perhaps the
greatest of all time, the extent and diversity of his dominions
considered, and the ability of the races over which he ruled taken
into the account,--was under the painful necessity of putting his
eldest son, Don Carlos, in close confinement, from which he never came
forth until he was brought out feet foremost, the presumption being
that he had been put to death by his father's orders. Carlos has been
made a hero of romance, but a more worthless character never lived.
On his death-bed Philip II. was compelled to see how little his son
Philip, who succeeded him, cared for his feelings and wishes. Peter
the Great put to death his son Alexis; and Frederick William I.
of Prussia came very near taking the life of that son of his who
afterward became Frederick the Great.
Jealousy is so common a feeling in Oriental royal houses, that it is
hardly allowable to quote anything from their history; but we may be
permitted to allude to the effect of one instance of paternal hate in
the Ottoman family at the time of its utmost greatness. Solyman
the Magnificent was jealous of his eldest son, Mustapha, who is
represented by all writers on the Turkish history of those times as
a remarkably superior man, and who, had he lived, would have been a
mighty foe to Christendom.
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