  An XMM-Newton observation of the luminous Seyfert 1 galaxy 1H 0419-577 is
presented. We find that the spectrum is well fitted by a power law of canonical
slope (gamma ~ 1.9) and 3 blackbody components (to model the strong soft
excess). The XMM data are compared and contrasted with observations by ROSAT in
1992 and by ASCA and BeppoSAX in 1996. We find that the overall X-ray spectrum
has changed substantially over the period, and suggest that the changes are
driven by the soft X-ray component. When bright, as in our XMM-Newton
observation, it appears that the enhanced soft flux cools the Comptonising
corona, causing the 2-10 keV power law to assume a `typical' slope, in contrast
to the unusually hard (`photon-starved') spectra observed by ASCA and BeppoSAX
four years earlier.
