Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. III.djvu/229

203 HER CHARACTER. 203 shade over Isabella's otherwise beautiful character, chapter might lead to a disparagement of her intellectual 1 power compared with that of the English queen. To estimate this aright, we must contemplate the results of their respective reigns. Elizabeth found all the materials of prosperity at hand, and availed herself of them most ably to build up a solid fabric of national grandeur. Isabella created these mate- rials. She saw the faculties of her people locked up in a deathlike lethargy, and she breathed into them the breath of life for those great and heroic enterprises, which terminated in such glorious con- sequences to the monarchy. It is when viewed from the depressed position of her early days, that the achievements of her reign seem scarcely less than miraculous. The masculine genius of the English queen stands out relieved beyond its natu- ral dimensions by its separation from the softer qualities of her sex. While her rival's, like some vast, but symmetrical edifice, loses in appearance somewhat of its actual grandeur from the perfect harmony of its proportions. The circumstances of their deaths, vt^hich were somewhat similar, displayed the great dissimilarity of their characters. Both pined amidst their royal state, a prey to incurable despondency, rather than any marked bodily distemper. In Elizabeth it sprung from wounded vanity, a sullen conviction, that she had outlived the admiration on which she had so long fed, — and even the solace of friend- ship, and the attachment of her subjects. Nor did she seek consolation, where alone it was to be