Litchfield enquirer., 1869-06-24
YittBdtlo Gnquirtr. Litchfleld, Thursday, June "A, 1869.
Queen Elizabeth.

Suffrage mistaken prejudice for argument, and habit for reason, but they are forced to dispute some of the best authenticated facts of history. A motion to set aside the verdict of three centuries in favor of Queen Elizabeth is no light matter, yet nothing less will satisfy Dr. Horace Bush- -nell, or the editor of the Tribune The former, speaking of her as Ca bad core in a fair apple. z z !''an odious, royalty destable woman,n asserts that ss If another woman had succeeded her, promising to be just liko her in rule, it is doubtful whether she, could have held the reins in hand for six months"
 We are at loss to conceive how any well informed student of the English history of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries could have penned such sentence. It was but two years before the "Great Queens" death, tbat the popular attack on monopolies occurred, regarding which Ma caulay says;-- n
 "The conduct of the extraordinary woman who then governed England, is an admirable study for politicians who live in unsuiet times. It shows how thoroughly she understood the people whom she ruled, and the crisis in which she was called to act. What she held she held firmly. Whatshe gave she gave graciously. She saw that 1t was necessary to make concession to the nation and she made it, not grudgingly or tardily, not as 8 Charles the First would have made it, but prompt ly and cordially. Before bill could be framed, or an address presented, she applied remedy to the evil of which the nation complained. She ex- f,1 bQF faithful Commons for detecting abuses which in terested persons had concealed from her. If her successors had inherited her wisdom with her crown, Charles the First might have died of old age, and James the Second would have seen St. Germains. "-Essdy co Hdnnpden.
 sDr. Bushnell characterizes her reign as follows:-
 ssShe was surrounded, as it were, and caged by a body of nobles, and grave councillors, and great men, pillared in wise moderation and heroic self respect; and she knocked herself about among them, first against one, and then against another. persecuting some, annoying all, and calling it gov. ernment whereas, in fact, they were all govern ing here with as much patience as they could, ol as much impationce as they must, and keeping her, by their changing attractions and repulslons within the endurable conditions"
 Whose ability gathered together these "great men pillared in wise moderation? ?'' Elizabeth took England weak, beaten, and divided against itself she left it strong, victorious and united. Her administra- ton was preceded by one of the worst, and followed by one of the weakest known to English history. It had no like prede- cessor, and no like successor; and yet Dr. Bushnell would have us believe that the credit of it is due to 8 body of "nobles, grave councillors" &c. l
 The Tribune accuses the queen of being precisely what Dr. Bushnell says she was not-the person really responsible for the administration of her reign. Instead of the fussy puppet ( held up largely by the scourteously moderated pity of her great men, of his reverend coadjutor, the 7s.i. ! bane pictures your genuine, blood. thirsty tyrant:--na ,eli7 zgnae4 ga
 "While our hand is in, we may as we'll notice a writer in the LitchJaeld Enquirer, who comes out agSi2st us to the rescue of that eminent yirago, |. Queen Elizabeth, as follows:
 f she boxed EssexS ears, there is doubt the pup py deserved it and, in the matter of cutting of heads how does she stand by the side of that royal Buebeard
 The Virgin Queen did not cut off so many heads as her royal father but she managed to execute about 200 Catholics, such, in the course of her reign+s" ten score, as Motley says, CT too many ;' and he addas l" She was as imperious and abso. lute by Temperament as her father had ever been. Lord Brougham says of her: "An assassin in her heart na 4, in her councils and in her orders an oppressor of the most unrelenting cruelty in falsehood was habitual, honest frankness strange such is the light in which she ought ever to be held up, so long as humanity and truth shall beal any valuei in the eyes of men," .a8g
 As we said in our former article. if tho Tri5nne wishes to meet the question fairly why does it not compare Queen Elizabetl with her cotemporariesp While she wal executing her two hundred Catholics, Al va was numbering his eighteen thousand Protestants on the scaffolds of the Neither lands, Charles the Ninth, his thirty thous and Huguenots on the anniversary of St Bartholomew Li Moreover. a large propor tion of the English executions were thos, of Catholics conspiring the queens assas sination. As for lying, how does Eliza beth compare with Philip IT of Spain. ant the precious. progeny of Catharine d, Medici. her cotemporary sovereigns?
 nWe have no liking for any form of ire sponsible government. Arbitrary power especially inherited arbitrary power, ,canno but aggrayate to a frightful degree, tn vices and avanitiess of the irresponsible ruler. hii Motley has done free in stitutions a great service in showing th much lauded administration of Queen Eliz abeth in it's true light; but because it would seem a very bad government in our time it by no means follows that it was not ar extremely good government in its own gen eration. Lord Macaulay, no admirer Q despotism, thus records his opinion O Elizabeth as ' ruler :g ss fFsls
 's0f all the sovereigns who exercised powe which was seemingly absolute, but which in fac depended for support on the love and confidenc of their subjects, she by far the most illustri ous.' It has often been alleged as an excuse fo the misgovernment of her successors that the only followed her example ;-that precedenf might be found in the transactions of her reior for prosecuting the Puritans, for lowing rnone without tho sanction of the House of Common, for eonfning men without bringing them to tria for interfering with the liberty of parliamentar debate All this may be true. But it is no goo plea for her successors, and for this plain reason that they were her successors. She governed on