Elizabeth I Quotes

It is hard to find beauty in the art of self expression.

I find that I sent wolves not shepherds to govern Ireland, for they have left me nothing but ashes and carcasses to reign over!

The use of sea and air is common to all; neither can a title to the ocean belong to any people or private persons, forasmuch as neither nature nor public use and custom permit any possession therof.

One man with a head on his shoulders is worth a dozen without.

Much suspected by me, Nothing proved can be

A meal of bread, cheese and beer constitutes the perfect food.

Although I may not be a lioness, I am a lion's cub, and inherit many of his qualities; and as long as the King of France treats me gently he will find me as gentle and tractable as he can desire; but if he be rough, I shall take the trouble to be just as troublesome and offensive to him as I can.

I grieve and dare not show my discontent, I love and yet am forced to seem to hate, I do, yet dare not say I ever meant, I seem stark mute but inwardly do prate. I am and not, I freeze and yet am burned, Since from myself another self I turned. My care is like my shadow in the sun, Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it, Stands and lies by me, doth what I have done.

The true sin against the Holy Ghost is ingratitude.

Chastity is the ermine of woman's soul.

[To Parliament, when it urged her to marry and settle the succession:] You attend to your own duties and I'll perform mine.

As for me, I see no such great cause why I should either be fond to live or fear to die. I have had good experience of this world, and I know what it is to be a subject and what to be a sovereign. Good neighbours I have had, and I have met with bad: and in trust I have found treason.

Young heads take example of the ancient

I pluck up the good lissome herbs of sentences by pruning, eat them by reading, digest them by musing, and lay them up at length in the high seat of memory.

I do not want a husband who honors me as a queen if he does not love me as a woman.

Monarchs ought to put to death the authors and instigators of war, as their sworn enemies and as dangers to their states.

The word must is not to be used to princes.

Anger makes dull men witty, but it keeps them poor.

I thank God I am endued with such qualities that if I were turned out of the Realm in my petticoat I were able to live in any place in Christendom.

There is one thing higher than Royalty: and that is religion, which causes us to leave the world, and seek God.

There is small disproportion betwixt a fool who useth not wit because he hath it not and him that useth it not when it should avail him.

Kings were wont to honour philosophers, but if I had such I would honour them as angels that should have such piety in them that they would not seek where they are the second to be the first, and where the third to be the second and so forth.

Mr. Doctor, that loose gown becomes you so well I wonder your notions should be so narrow.

Answer on being asked her opinion of Christ's presence in the Sacrament. 'Twas God the word that spake it, He took the Bread and brake it; And what the word did make it That I believe, and take it.

Where minds differ and opinions swerve there is scant a friend in that company.

I will have here but one mistress and no master.

[On Thomas Seymour's death:] This day died a man of much wit and very little judgment.

They best pass over the world who trip over it quickly; for it is but a bog. If we stop, we sink.

Let the good service of well-deservers be never rewarded with loss. Let their thanks be such as may encourage more strivers for the like.

There is no marvel in a woman learning to speak, but there would be in teaching her to hold her tongue

I do not choose that my grave should be dug while I am still alive.

There is nothing about which I am more anxious than my country, and for its sake I am willing to die ten deaths, if that be possible.

When we hang on to resentments, we poison ourselves. As compulsive overeaters, we cannot afford resentment, since it exacerbates our disease.

I have seen many a man turn his gold into smoke, but you are the first who has turned smoke into gold.

O Fortune, how thy restless, wavering state has fraught with cares my troubled wit!

If there were two princes in Christendom who had good will and courage, it would be very easy to reconcile the religious difficulties; there is only one Jesus Christ and one faith, and all the rest is a dispute over trifles.

Had I been crested, not cloven, my Lords, you had not treated me thus.

Let tyrants fear, I have always so behaved myself that, under God, I have placed my chiefest strength and safeguard in the loyal hearts and good-will of my subjects.

It has been always held for a special principle in friendship that prosperity provideth but adversity proveth friends.

A strength to harm is perilous in the hand of an ambitious head.

I have already joined myself in marriage to a husband, namely the kingdom of England.

He who placed me in this seat will keep me here.

[To Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, on his return from self-imposed exile, occasioned by the embarrassing flatulence he had experienced in the presence of the Queen:] My Lord, I had forgot the fart.

I don't keep a dog and bark myself.

For, what is a family without a steward, a ship without a pilot, a flock without a shepherd, a body without a head, the same, I think, is a kingdom without the health and safety of a good monarch.

If I follow the inclination of my nature, it is this: beggar-woman and single, far rather than queen and married.

Be always faithful to me, as I always desire to keep you in peace; and if there have been wiser kings, none has ever loved you more than I have.

[When opposed by leaders of her Council:] I will make you shorter by the head!