The social changes were, as has been shown, all for good.  Education became not the privilege of the few but the right of all who wished for it.  Step by step the people gained in power and in the right to govern themselves.  The idea of citizenship, of a patriotism which extended beyond the narrow limits of these isles, slowly took root and blossomed.  Through all these manifold changes the Queen reigned, ever alert, and even in her last years taking the keenest interest in the growth of her mighty kingdom.

“The use of the Queen in a dignified capacity is incalculable,” declared Walter Bagehot in his famous essay on The English Constitution.  He continues:  “Without her in England, the present English Government would fail and pass away.”  It is interesting to read the reasons which such a clear and distinguished thinker gives to explain the hold which the Monarchy retains upon the English nation as a whole.

Firstly:  there is the Family, of which the Queen is the head; the Nation looks upon her as its mother, witness its enthusiasm at the marriage of the Prince of Wales.

Secondly:  The Monarchy strengthens the Government with the strength of religion.  It is the duty of a loyal citizen to obey his Queen; the oath of allegiance is no empty form.  The Queen from her very position acts as a symbol of unity.

Thirdly:  The Queen is the head of our society; she represents England in the eyes of foreign nations.

Fourthly:  The Monarchy is the head of our morality.  The example of Queen Victoria’s simple life has not been lost upon the nation.  It is now quite a natural thing to expect and to find the domestic virtues personified in the ruling monarch, and this in spite of the fact that history has shown what temptations lie in the way of those possessed of the highest power in the state.

Shakespeare voiced the feeling of the people for the kingship in the words which he put into the mouth of Henry V: 

    Upon the king! let us our lives, our souls,
    Our debts, our careful wives,
    Our children, and our sins, lay on the king: 
    We must bear all. 
    O hard condition! twin-born with greatness,
    Subject to the breath of every fool, whose sense
    No more can feel but his own wringing! 
    What infinite heart’s ease must kings neglect,
    That private men enjoy? 
    And what have kings that privates have not too,
    Save ceremony, save general ceremony?

And lastly, the actual Government of the country may change but the Monarch remains, subject to no changes of Parliament, above and aloof from the strife of political parties, the steadying influence in times of transition.

The Sovereign has three rights:  “The right to be consulted, the right to encourage, the right to warn.”  A comparison of the reigns of the four Georges with the reign of Queen Victoria shows that it was only during the latter’s reign that the duties of the constitutional monarch were well and conscientiously performed.  The Queen worked as well as her Ministers, and was their equal and often their superior in business capacity.  To conclude:  “The benefits of a good monarch are almost invaluable, but the evils of a bad monarch are almost irreparable.”