“I am quite clear,” said the Queen, speaking of her eldest daughter, then a child, “that she should be taught to have great reverence for God and for religion, and that she should have the feeling of devotion and love which our Heavenly Father encourages His earthly children to have for Him and not one of fear and trembling.”
“Reverence for God!” No one will deny that the Queen in the closing years of her long and splendid reign must have seen this reverence dying out and that her heart must often have been surcharged with weeping when she considered the great change that has come over modern thought and modern life since she first ascended the throne, a shy, pretty little girl, with all England waiting to do her homage. She must have noticed a complete departure from old ways and customs which, however simple they were, certainly did mark English women as the Queen-roses of the world, and did so influence men to love their homes and to work for the glory of their country that they were able to leave it greater than they found it. She must have watched Progress marching with swift, impetuous strides in one direction,—but Retrogression and Decay marching as steadily, though more slowly in another,—progress let us say in machinery, but retrogression in men. Who shall count the tears the Queen has shed for the evils which she, with her well-known wisdom and prescience, may not have foreseen coming upon England! Who shall estimate the grief and pain she has suffered on account of the cruel war which has ravaged the homes of a people who are one with ourselves in the Christian faith,—a war which, in her last days on earth, she had to learn was not ended, but rather likely to be prolonged! Noble-hearted, deeply God-loving woman as she was, her beautiful spirit on the verge of eternal glory, must have often contemplated the dark clouds on England’s horizon with the most poignant and tender sorrow, and her anxiety for the many difficulties likely to surround her son, our King, must have been acute and pitiful indeed. For there can be no doubt that much of the peace of Europe was the result of her personal influence; and personal influence is a far more important factor in the welding together and holding of countries and peoples than is generally taken into account by such of us as are superficial observers and who imagine everything is done by Governments.
How many times in the history of the world has it been proved that Governments are paralyzed in a great national crisis, and powerless to avert a great national disaster! How often have the men composing the governing body lost their heads in emergency, and thrown aside their responsibilities in desperate dismay at the suddenly rising tide of difficulties, many of which they had not foreseen! But the Queen’s heart was true; her trust in God never faltered,—and her woman’s hand, so small and delicate, held all things in the clasp of a fearless love and faith such as we are told can remove mountains. One may say of her that she taught all her fellow sovereigns the dignity of sovereignty. There was no German Empire when she first came to the throne. There was no free or united Italy. England’s chief foes were France and Russia,—and may it not be said that they are her foes still? Yet in Russia the personal influence of our late beloved Monarch has been of weight, apart altogether from the ties of blood which unite her family with that of the Tsar. Her personal word,—the benign action of her quiet personal authority—these have smoothed over many animosities which might otherwise have become subjects of hot international dispute. The woman’s word and the woman’s touch are marvellous in their working for good if the woman herself be pure and true! When Bismarck, known as “the man of blood and iron,” called the Queen “the greatest Statesman in Europe” his remark was neither a flattery nor an exaggeration. It was strictly correct. The Queen possessed the two supreme gifts with which God endows unspoilt women, Instinct and Tact. While men with heavy logic and contentious disputes wearily argued pros and cons of various deep questions, the Queen, bringing her quick brain to bear on the subject in hand, easily sprang to a straight issue, and by a word here, a gentle suggestion there, skilfully guided slower perceptions and duller wits out of darkness into light. Her loss means much more than is at present apparent to Europe. The very fact of her sex commanded reverence and respect; a woman’s prayer has often proved more potent than a man’s command!
Strange, beautiful and pathetic is the picture given to our thoughts of the dead Majesty of England,—white and still, lying in her snowy death-robes with the first snowdrops of the year and lilies around her, and the golden Cross shining above her,—that emblem of the Christian Faith which, in its simplest form, the Queen followed fervently without any faltering doubt or fear. The words of one of her favourite hymns were the daily echo of her own heart’s trust in the Divine,—
“Thy way, not mine, O Lord,
However dark it be;
Lead me by Thine own Hand,
Choose out the path for me.
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