ELIZABETH ( 1533-1603 1. Queen of England. She was the daughter of Ilenry VIII. and the unfortunate Anne Boleyn, and was born Septem her 7. 1533. While she was yet in her third year her mother was beheaded. After the moth er's. execution Elizabeth was sent to the country, where the greater part of her early youth wits :Tent. When Catharine Parr becann. Queen. KHz abeth. who was a favorite with her, Was 11101T often seen at Court but for some unknown incise she incurred her father's displeasure, and was again sent to the country, ller father died when she was thirteen years old. 1)n•ing the reign of her brother. Edward VI., her passed quietly and peacefully. She Was then remarkable for great demureness. so that Edward used to speak of her as hi- 'sweet sister Temperance.' Iler Protestantism. and the court with+ was paid to her by the Protestant nobility% caused uneasi n•ss to Mary and her council. At her sister's command she conformed to the Roman Catholic faith, but the insincerity of the conversion im posed upon no one. Int the pretext of having been concerned in Wyatt's rebellion. she Was sent in 1554 to the Tower. The warrant for her ex ecution was at line time prepared, but her popu larity saved her, as her sister's advisers feared an uprising if Elizabeth was put to death. Nevertheless for some time she was kept a prisoner at Woodstock. During the remainder of Alary's reign Elizabeth. though oc casionally at Court, resided chiefly at her resi dence of Hatfield douse. in Hertfordshire.
When Mary died. November 17. 1558, Elizabeth was twenty-live years of age. Her accession was welcomed alike by Catholics and by Protestants. She then began., amid dangers and diffi•ulties, reign which, to the expectation of all, was of unexampled length and prosperity. it would he wrong not to attribute to her influence some effect in produeing the great changes which, during the next forty-font- years, took place in England: but so far :is these changes were not 1irodu•441 in the natural course of the develop ment of the nation's power, and so far as they bear the mark of an individual mind, they hear much more the impress of the hold yet cautious judgment and clear intellect of her great minis ter. (boil. than of Elizabeth. The essentially Prole,tant character of her policy was shown at the very beginning of her reign. and in •onse quence of this a Protestant majority was re• turned to her first Parliament. In 1550 a new Act of Supremacy was passed. In 1560 Eliza
beth e1/11e11141e41 a treaty of alliance at Berwick with the Scotch Reformers, who were joined by an English force. The Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England were pithlished in 1563.
The policy of Elizabeth's ministers, on the whole, was one of peace and economy. No war was utelertaken in her reign for the sake of territorial conquest. To strengthen her own throne, Elizabeth assisted the Protestants in Scotland. in France. and in the Low Coun tries: hut she had few open wars. To main tain her own security, and to prevent for eign interference in English matters, was the mainspring of her foreign policy: and she lost no opportunity of weakening and lhndiug occupation abroad for any foreign power that unduly threatened her authority. ller diplomacy was tortuous and sway' d by innumerable change.; of mind: but she attained her ends. Iler parsimony was well known and sometimes dis astrous. I tail she given ample succor to the Dutch as the nation wished, the result of the war would have been much more advantageous to England. The inadequate provisions and am Munition of the English fleet wouhl likely have led to had results had the Spanish Armada heen placed in more competent hands. However, her parsimony was necessary while the nation was poor. The one great ldunder of Elizahoth's policy was the treatment of Mary, Queen of Scots, who, after her defeat by the Regent Alurray, at Lang side, in 1568, had sought refuge in England, only to become a captive in the hands of the English Queen. Daring neither to execute her pris oner. as several of the ministers advised, nor to release her, in which case she would probably have gone to Spain or Franey, and by a foreign marriage have forfeited the sympathies of the Scotch and English Elizabeth regained her a prisoner. and thus for years gave cause to conspiracy after conspiracy among the English Catholics. For a rebellion incited to set Mary free, the richest and most popular of the English nobles. Norfolk. Was exe cuted in 1572. The plots then took on a graver spect. The assassination of Elizabeth and the placing of _Mary on her throne became their ob ject. On the discovery of Babington's conspiracy for this purpose, the popular cry for Mary's death was irresistible, and was jiiineel in by Walsinghatil, and others of Elizabeth's ministers, With reluctance and hesitation Enz. beth consented: and Mary. after long years of confinement, was condemned and executed in 1557.