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

I do not so much rejoice that God hath made me to be a Queen, as to be a Queen over so thankful a people.

Though the sex to which I belong is considered weak you will nevertheless find me a rock that bends to no wind.

As for my own part I care not for death, for all men are mortal; and though I be a woman yet I have as good a courage answerable to my place as ever my father had. I am your anointed Queen. I will never be by violence constrained to do anything. I thank God I am indeed endowed 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.

A clear and innocent conscience fears nothing.

[I]n the end this shall be for me sufficient, that a marble stone shall declare that a Queen, having reigned such a time, lived and died a virgin.