Elizabeth I of England

"So it was that in 1585, with the Anglo–Spanish War nearly upon Elizabeth’s shore, Elizabeth and Murad discussed an Anglo–Ottoman alliance against Catholic Spain grounded in religious commonality. Though the alliance never came to fruition, the resulting trade agreements between the two peoples gave England the impetus to become a worldwide empire of its own. Because England was a Protestant state, outside of papal authority, it was in a favored position to seek an alliance with the Ottoman Empire. Further, as a consequence of ignoring the 1578 papal ban on Christians dealing in arms with Muslims, England was in an ideal position to trade prosperously with the Ottomans—to the neglect of the Catholic states."

"Her hands were ever working for the defence of the Faith, defending it at home, defending it abroad, for her selfe defending it, and defending it for others; ever in travell for this holy businesse."

"That great Queen has now been lying two hundred and thirty years in Henry the Seventh's Chapel. Yet her memory is still dear to the hearts of a free people."

"A succession of dark plots, formed by Roman Catholics against the life of the Queen and the existence of the nation, kept society in constant alarm. Whatever might be the faults of Elizabeth, it was plain that, to speak humanly, the fate of the realm and of all reformed Churches was staked on the security of her person and on the success of her administration. To strengthen her hands was, therefore, the first duty of a patriot and a Protestant; and that duty was well performed. The Puritans, even in the depths of the prisons to which she had sent them, prayed, and with no simulated fervour, that she might be kept from the dagger of the assassin, that rebellion might be put down under her feet, and that her arms might be victorious by sea and land. One of the most stubborn of the stubborn sect, immediately after his hand had been lopped off for an offence into which he had been hurried by his intemperate zeal, waved his hat with the hand which was still left him, and shouted "God save the Queen!" The sentiment with which these men regarded her has descended to their posterity. The Nonconformists, rigorously as she treated them, have, as a body, always venerated her memory."

"She was the most remarkable princess that has appeared in the world for these many centuries. In all her actions she displayed the greatest prudence... I say, in conclusion, she was the most prudent in governing, the most active in all business, the most clear-sighted in seeing events, and the most resolute in seeing her resolutions carried into effect... in a word, [she] possessed, in the highest degree, all the qualities which are required in a great prince."

"She had high Notions of the sovereign Power of Princes, and of her own absolute Supremacy in Church Affairs: And being of Opinion that all Methods of Severity were lawful to bring her Subjects to an outward Uniformity, she countenanced all the Engines of Persecution, as Spiritual Courts, High Commission, and Star-Chamber, and stretched her Prerogative to support them beyond the Laws, and against the Sense of the Nation. But with all these Blemishes Queen Elizabeth stands upon Record as a wise and politick Princess, for delivering the Kingdom from the Difficulties in which it was involved at her Accession; for preserving the Protestant Reformation against the potent Attempts of the Pope, the Emperor, and King of Spain abroad, and the Queen of Scots and her Popish Subjects at home; and for advancing the Renown of the English Nation beyond any of her Predecessors. Her Majesty held the Balance of Europe, and was in high Esteem with all foreign Princes, the greatest Part of her Reign; and tho' her Protestant Subjects were divided about Church Affairs, they all discover'd a high Veneration for her Royal Person and Government; on which Accounts she was the Glory of the Age in which she lived, and will be the Admiration of Posterity."

"It is difficult to convey a proper appreciation of this amazing Queen, so keenly intelligent, so effervescing, so intimate, so imperious and regal. She intoxicated Court and country, keyed her realm to the intensity of her own spirit. No one but a woman could have done it, and no woman without her superlative gifts could have attempted it without disaster."

"This woman was as vital as Winston Churchill, and, like him, made romantic leadership an art of government. The name ‘Gloriana’ and the phrase ‘via media’ seem odd companions. But the liberal way of life is richest and fullest, and it was well for England that when men's passions led them from it, Queen Elizabeth preserved the tradition. Her Puritan fanatics had no more obstinate opponent: she, in turn, had no more devoted worshippers. It is the strangest paradox of her reign and the supreme tribute to her greatness."

"Greater than Alexander she was, for the world which he subdued by force, she conquered by love."

"Elizabeth, great empress of the world, Britannia's Atlas, star of England's globe, That sways the massy sceptre of her land, And holds the royal reins of Albion."

"Commonwealth schoolchildren are often taught one of the key events in British history with the help of a mnemonic: "King Henry the Eighth, to six wives he was wedded: One died, one survived, two divorced, two beheaded." Beheaded! In 1536 Henry had his wife Anne Boleyn decapitated on trumped-up charges of adultery and treason because she gave him a son that did not survive, and he had become attracted to one of her ladies-in-waiting. Two wives later he suspected Catherine Howard of adultery and sent her to the ax as well. (Tourists visiting the Tower of London can see the chopping block for themselves.) Henry was clearly the jealous type: he also had an old boyfriend of Catherine’s drawn and quartered, which is to say hanged by the neck, taken down while still alive, disemboweled, castrated, decapitated, and cut into four. The throne passed to Henry’s son Edward, then to Henry’s daughter Mary, and then to another daughter, Elizabeth. “Bloody Mary” did not get her nickname by putting tomato juice in her vodka but by having three hundred religious dissenters burned at the stake. And both sisters kept up the family tradition for how to resolve domestic squabbles: Mary imprisoned Elizabeth and presided over the execution of their cousin, Lady Jane Grey, and Elizabeth executed another cousin, Mary Queen of Scots. Elizabeth also had 123 priests drawn and quartered, and had other enemies tortured with bone-crushing manacles, another attraction on display in the Tower. Today the British royal family is excoriated for shortcomings ranging from rudeness to infidelity. You’d think people would give them credit for not having had a single relative decapitated, nor a single rival drawn and quartered."

"She was most lavishly attired in a gown of pure white satin, gold-embroidered, with a whole bird of paradise for panache, set forward on her head studded with costly jewels, wore a string of huge round pearls about her neck and elegant gloves over which were drawn costly rings. In short she was most gorgeously apparelled, and although she was already seventy four, was very youthful still in appearance, seeming no more than twenty years of age. She had a dignified and regal bearing, and, as noted above, rules her kingdom with great wisdom in peace and prosperity and the fear of God, has up till now successfully confronted her opponents with God's help and support, as can be testified by all the histories, and although her life has often been threatened by poison and many ill designs, God has preserved her wonderfully at all times."

"In 1603 King James VI of Scotland succeeded the childless Queen Elizabeth I on the throne of England as James I. Thereafter, although frequently professing an intimate attachment to their ancient kingdom, both he and his son King Charles I, who succeeded him in 1625, regarded themselves first and foremost as English monarchs. Scotland nevertheless still retained its own parliament, referred to as the Estates, and therefore its own quite separate system of government. Unfortunately, moves initiated by Charles I in 1633 with the aim of bringing both the Scottish church and legal system into line with English practice proved to be a disastrous mistake. In 17th century Britain religion and politics were still inextricably linked, and the monarchy's temporal and religious prerogatives were both the subject of passionate debate among the influential classes. Less than a century beforehand the struggle between Roman Catholic and Protestant had seen religious martyrs burned alive at the stake; and despite Elizabeth's generally successful establishment of the Anglican Protestant church of England created by her father Henry VIII, both her reign and that of James I were intermittently troubled by Roman Catholic conspiracies."

"John Hawkins made three trips to West Africa in the 1560s, and stole Africans whom he sold to the Spanish in America. On returning to England after the first trip, his profit was so handsome that Queen Elizabeth I became interested in directly participating in his next venture; and she provided for that purpose a ship named the Jesus. Hawkins left with the Jesus to steal some more Africans, and he returned to England with such dividends that Queen Elizabeth made him a knight. Hawkins chose as his coat of arms the representation of an African in chains."

"Queen Elizabeth is the greatest of English, perhaps of all modern sovereigns. In a period remarkable for long and sanguinary wars, she made her name respected abroad, without a waste of blood or treasure; and, in a time of great political ferment, she maintained the most absolute authority at home, without any loss of the affections of her people. She obtained glory without conquest, and unlimited power without odium."

"She hath been highly valued since her death, the best of any former sovereign over us. She was fitted for fortune's darling but with some improvement to mould her for the rule and sovereignty of a kingdom... she showed her justice and piety as a precedent to posterity... She was magnificent comparativè with other princes, which yet she disposed frugally, having always much to do with little money."

"Elizabeth I got it absolutely right in her famous speech at Tilbury, when she said, in effect, I may be a goddess but I'm also flesh and blood, "resolved in the midst and heat of the battle to live and die amongst you all". She told them she was there to take up arms, "I myself will be your General Judge and Rewarder of virtues in the field". It was fantastic, so moving, so dazzling, so proto-Churchillian. There wasn't a dry eye anywhere. It was a masterpiece of propaganda and she meant it all. She was there as goddess, monarch and chief executive of Britannia Inc – the perfect synthesis of all three at last."

"All the modern life and greatness of England can be traced to those forty-four years in which so many old thoughts were forgotten and so many new thoughts were conceived. This is Elizabeth's work... [W]hen we consider her, not in herself but in relation to English history, we ask, what was her work? And we answer that the greatness of it can scarcely be exaggerated, so that if, in her own language, she was married to that generation of Englishmen we may add that she is the mother of all generations that have succeeded."

"This royal infant—heaven still move about her— Though in her cradle, yet now promises Upon this land a thousand thousand blessings, Which time shall bring to ripeness: she shall be... A pattern to all princes living with her, And all that shall succeed... She shall be loved and feared. Her own shall bless her; Her foes shake like a field of beaten corn, And hang their heads with sorrow... In her days every man shall eat in safety Under his own vine, what he plants, and sing The merry songs of peace to all his neighbours... She shall be, to the happiness of England, An aged princess. Many days shall see her, And yet no day without a deed to crown it. Would I had known no more. But she must die— She must, the saints must have her—yet a virgin, A most unspotted lily shall she pass To th' ground, and all the world shall mourn her."

"If it be a reproach to us that women have reigned over us, ’tis much more to the princes that succeeded our Henry, that none of them did so much imitate him in his government as Queen Elizabeth. She did not go about to mangle acts of parliament, and to pick out what might serve her turn, but frequently passed forty or fifty in a session, without reading one of them. She knew that she did not reign for herself, but for her people; that what was good for them, was either good for her, or that her good ought not to come into competition with that of the whole nation; and that she was by oath obliged to pass such laws as were presented to her on their behalf."

"She certainly is a great queen, and were she only a Catholic she would be our dearly beloved. Just look how well she governs; she is only a woman, only mistress of half an island, and yet she makes herself feared by Spain, by France, by the Empire, by all."

"[H]er presence and princely encouragement, Bellona-like, infused a second spirit of love, loyaltie, and resolution into every souldier in her Armie; who, being (as it were) ravished with their Souveraygne's sight, that [all] (as well Commanders as common souldiers) quite forgate the ficklenesse of fortune and the chance of Warre, and prayed heartily the Spanyards might land quickly; and, when they knew they were fled, they beganne to lament."

"I acquiesce in the eulogy bestowed upon her by Thuanus, who concludes his enumeration of her great abilities by saying that she had those of a king, not merely as such, but of a very great king. I cannot bestow praises upon the Queen of England equal to the abilities which I discovered in her in this short time, both as to the qualities of her heart and of her understanding."

"In all the centuries that have passed, there has never been seen a woman who could be considered the equal of this great Queen."

"To her own people she boasted on her accession that she was ‘mere English.’ Her mother had been no foreign princess but an English flirt, and her father, the founder of England's Navy and of England's religious independence, had possessed a sixth sense whereby he understood the English people, even in the highest rages of his tyranny. She inherited from both, but most from her father in whose steps it was her ambition to walk. If she was heir to her mother's vanity and coquetry, she heeded the warning of her fate; and her own bitter experiences as a girl,—disgrace, imprisonment and danger of death,—had taught her, as Frederic the Great was taught by similar experiences in boyhood, that private affections and passions are not for Princes. She had learnt every lesson that adversity had to teach, and she would leave it to her rival to lose the world for love."

"There was in her a certain hardness and coarseness of fibre, necessary perhaps for her terrible task in life. As a private person she would scarcely have been lovable, perhaps not even very admirable. But lonely on the throne she knew all the arts to make herself adored by her Court and her people. Without ceasing to be a woman, and while loving life in its fullness, she made everything subservient to purposes of State. Her learning endeared her to the Universities, her courage to the soldiers and sailors. Her coquetry became a means of keeping her nobles and courtiers each in his place, and exacting from each one the last ounce of personal devotion in the public service. Leicester's neck might be tickled by the royal hand, but his rival Cecil would be trusted in matters of high policy... Her love of hunting and dancing, masque, pageantry and display, was used to strengthen the wider popularity which was her ultimate strength; her public appearances and progresses through the country, which she thoroughly enjoyed, were no dull and formal functions, but works of art by a great player whose heart was in the piece, interchanges of soul between a Princess and her loving people."

"The Queen sitting all alone in her splendid coach appeared like a goddess such as painters are wont to depict."

"[T]he most glorious Sun that ever shined in our Firmament of England (the never to be forgotten Queen Elizabeth, of happy memory)."

"Queen Elizabeth, a princess, as ye wot, of no mingled blood of Spaniard or stranger, but born mere English here among us and therefore most natural unto us; of education, brought up and instructed in all virtuous qualities and godly learning, specially (that may be most comfort and joy to us all), in the sincere knowledge and following of God's Holy Word; of natural inclination, so godly disposed as without revenge she patiently suffered so much malice and wrong; of wisdom, so ware as she may shun the inconveniences and follies that her sister fell in."

"On the 14th of January [1603] the late Queen who had two days before sickened with a cold...removed to Richmond. But a little before her going, even the same morning, the Earl of Nottingham, High-Admiral of England, coming to her...she fell into some speech of the Succession; and then she told him, “that her seat had ever been the throne of Kings, and none but her next heire of bloud and descent should succeed her.”"

"[On 23 March 1603 the] lord admirall put her mind of her speech, concerning the succession...and that they, in the name of all the rest of her councell, came unto her to knowe her pleasure who should succeede. Whereunto she thus replyed; “I told you my seat had been the seat of kings, and I will have no rascall to succeed me, and who should succeed me, but a king?” The lords not understanding this darke speech, and looking the one on the other, at length Mr Secretary boldly asked her, what she meant by these words, “That no rascall should succeed her?” whereunto she replyed, “That her meaning was, that a king should succeed her, and who,” quoth she, “should that be, but our cozen of Scotland.” They asked her whether that were her absolute resolution? whereunto she answered, “I pray you trouble me no more. I'll have none but him;” with which answer they departed."

"In Eighty Eight how she did fight Is known to all and some, When the Spaniard came, her courage to tame, But had better have stay'd at home: They came with Ships, fill'd full of Whips, To have lash'd her Princely Hide; But she had a Drake made them all cry Quake, And bang'd them back and side."

"A Tudor! A Tudor! We've had Stuarts enough, None ever reign'd like old Bess in her ruff."

"Your Popish Plot and Smithfield Threat, We do not fear at all, For Loe! beneath Queen Besses feet, You fall, you fall, you fall."

"Fixt in our hearts thy Fame shall live, And maugre all the Popish spight; To honour thee our Youth shall strive, And Yearly Celebrate this Night."

"Britannia's Figure once could Passion move, And Princes either fear'd or sought her Love. When fam'd Eliza gave one single Nod, The Spaniard bow'd, nay cring'd and fear'd her Rod"