1. Quotes
  2. Authors
  3. Charles I of England

Charles I of England Quotes

Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649.

Charles was born into the House of Stuart as the second son of King James VI of Scotland, but after his father inherited the English throne in 1603 , he moved to England, where he spent much of the rest of his life. He became heir apparent to the three kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1612 on the death of his elder brother Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales. An unsuccessful and unpopular attempt to marry him to the Spanish Habsburg princess Maria Anna culminated in an eight-month visit to Spain in 1623 that demonstrated the futility of the marriage negotiations. Two years later he married the Bourbon princess Henrietta Maria of France.

After his succession in 1625, Charles quarrelled with the Parliament of England, which sought to curb his royal prerogative. Charles believed in the divine right of kings, and was determined to govern according to his own conscience. Many of his subjects opposed his policies, in particular the levying of taxes without parliamentary consent, and perceived his actions as those of a tyrannical absolute monarch. His religious policies, coupled with his marriage to a Roman Catholic, generated the antipathy and mistrust of Reformed groups such as the English Puritans and Scottish Covenanters, who thought his views were too Catholic. He supported high church Anglican ecclesiastics, such as Richard Montagu and William Laud, and failed to aid Protestant forces successfully during the Thirty Years' War. His attempts to force the Church of Scotland to adopt high Anglican practices led to the Bishops' Wars, strengthened the position of the English and Scottish parliaments, and helped precipitate his own downfall.

From 1642, Charles fought the armies of the English and Scottish parliaments in the English Civil War. After his defeat in 1645, he surrendered to a Scottish force that eventually handed him over to the English Parliament. Charles refused to accept his captors' demands for a constitutional monarchy, and temporarily escaped captivity in November 1647. Re-imprisoned on the Isle of Wight, Charles forged an alliance with Scotland, but by the end of 1648 Oliver Cromwell's New Model Army had consolidated its control over England. Charles was tried, convicted, and executed for high treason in January 1649. The monarchy was abolished and the Commonwealth of England was established as a republic. The monarchy would be restored to Charles's son, Charles II, in 1660. Wikipedia  

✵ 19. November 1600 – 30. January 1649   •   Other names Re Carlo I d'Inghilterra
Charles I of England photo
Charles I of England: 7   quotes 3   likes

Famous Charles I of England Quotes

“Princes are not bound to give an account of their Actions but to God alone.”

Charles I of England

Declaration on the dissolution of Parliament (10 March 1628)

“Be your holiness persuaded that I am, and ever shall be, of such moderation as to keep aloof, as far as possible, from every undertaking which may testify any hatred towards the Roman Catholic religion. Nay, rather I will seize all opportunities, by a gentle and generous mode of conduct, to remove all sinister suspicions entirely; so that, as we all confess one undivided Trinity and one Christ crucified, we may be banded together unanimously into one faith.”

Charles I of England

Letter to Pope Gregory XV (20 April 1623).
Sir Charles Petrie (ed.), The Letters...of King Charles I (1935), p. 16.

“I cannot flatter myself with the expectation of good success more than this, to end my days with honour and a good conscience.”

Charles I of England

Remark to Prince Rupert of the Rhine in 1646, just before surrendering to Parliament and its New Model Army. As quoted in Early Modern England: A Narrative History (2009) by Robert Bucholz and Newton Key, p. 258
Context: I confess that, speaking as a mere soldier or statesman, there is no probability of my ruin; yet, as a Christian, I must tell you that God will not suffer rebels and traitors to prosper, nor this cause be overthrown, and whatever personal punishment it shall please hi to inflict on me, must not make me repine, much less give over this quarrel... Indeed, I cannot flatter myself with the expectation of good success more than this, to end my days with honour and a good conscience.

“For the people. And truly I desire their Liberty and Freedom as much as any Body whomsoever. But I must tell you, That their Liberty and Freedom, consists in having of Government; those Laws, by which their Life and their goods may be most their own. It is not for having a share in government (Sir) that is nothing pertaining to them. A subject and a sovereign are clean different things, and therefore until they do that, I mean, that you do put the people in that liberty as I say, certainly they will never enjoy themselves.
Sirs, It was for this that now I Have come here. If I would have given way to an Arbitrary way, for to have all Laws changed according to the power of the Sword, I needed not to have come here; and therefore, I tell you, (and I pray God it be not laid to your charge) That I Am the Martyr of the People.”

Charles I of England

On the scaffold before his execution. ( 30 January, 1649 http://anglicanhistory.org/charles/charles1.html).

“I am no less confident, that no learned lawyer will affirm that an impeachment can lie against the King, they all going in his name: and one of their maxims is, that the King can do no wrong.”

Charles I of England

Reasons for declining the jurisdiction of the High Court of Justice http://www.constitution.org/eng/conpur083.htm (21 January 1649)

“I go from a corruptible to an incorruptible Crown, where no disturbance can be, no disturbance in the World.”

Charles I of England

Last words, said on the scaffold before his execution. ( 30 January, 1649 http://anglicanhistory.org/charles/charles1.html).

“Since I see all the birds are flown, I do expect from you that you will send them unto me as soon as they return hither. But, I assure you on the word of a king, I never did intend any force, but shall proceed against them in a legal and fair way, for I never meant any other.”

Charles I of England

Statement in the House of Commons after failing to arrest five members (4 January 1642), from the journal of Sir Simonds d'Ewes

Similar authors

Robert Burns photo
Robert Burns 114
Scottish poet and lyricist
John Wesley photo
John Wesley 77
Christian theologian
Frederick II of Prussia photo
Frederick II of Prussia 36
king of Prussia
George Herbert photo
George Herbert 216
Welsh-born English poet, orator and Anglican priest
Thomas More photo
Thomas More 26
English Renaissance humanist
Thomas Fuller photo
Thomas Fuller 35
English churchman and historian
Samuel Johnson photo
Samuel Johnson 362
English writer
Isaac Newton photo
Isaac Newton 171
British physicist and mathematician and founder of modern c…
Francis Bacon photo
Francis Bacon 295
English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and auth…
Thomas Cranmer photo
Thomas Cranmer 2
leader of the English Reformation and Archbishop of Canterb…