Queen Elizabeth II Quotes

Good memories are our second chance at happiness.

We all need to get the balance right between action and reflection.

With so many distractions, it is easy to forget to pause and take stock.

[On being criticized for her serious expression:] I simply ache from smiling.

Why are women expected to beam all the time? It's unfair. If a man looks solemn, it's automatically assumed he's a serious person, not a miserable one.

Family does not necessarily mean blood relatives but often a description of a community, organisation or nation.

When life seems hard, the courageous do not lie down and accept defeat;

instead, they are all the more determined to struggle for a better future.

There are long periods when life seems a small, dull round, a petty business with no point, and then suddenly we are caught up in some great event which gives us a glimpse of the solid and durable foundations of our existence.

It has been women who have breathed gentleness and care into the hard progress of humankind.

I have to be seen to be believed.

For Christians, as for all people of faith, reflection, meditation and prayer help us to renew ourselves in God's love, as we strive daily to become better people. The Christmas message shows us that this love is for everyone. There is no one beyond its reach.

The world is not the most pleasant place.

Eventually, your parents leave you and nobody is going to go out of their way to protect you unconditionally. You need to learn to stand up for yourself and what you believe and sometimes, pardon my language, kick some ass.

Cowards falter, but danger is often overcome by those who nobly dare.

True patriotism doesn't exclude an understanding of the patriotism of others.

[To a woman whose cellphone rang during a formal meeting:] You'd better answer that. It could be someone important.

I believe that there is a great fear in our generation of being labeled as priggish.

What were once only hopes for the future have now come to pass.

Like all the best families, we have our share of eccentricities, of impetuous and wayward youngsters and of family disagreements.

The upward course of a nation's history is due in the long run to the soundness of heart of its average men and women

[Before each of numerous portrait sittings:] Now then, with teeth or without?

At Christmas, I am always struck by how the spirit of togetherness lies also at the heart of the Christmas story. A young mother and a dutiful father with their baby were joined by poor shepherds and visitors from afar. They came with their gifts to worship the Christ child.

Football's a difficult business and aren't they prima donnas. But it's a wonderful game.

[On the 1982 intruder into her bedroom:] I realized immediately that it wasn't a servant because they don't slam doors.

Think what we would have missed if we had never .

.. used a mobile phone or surfed the Net -- or, to be honest, listened to other people talking about surfing the Net.

This new power, which has proved itself to be such a terrifying weapon of destruction, is harnessed for the first time for the common good of our community.

Families, friends and communities often find a source of courage rising up from within. Indeed, sadly, it seems that it is tragedy that often draws out the most and the best from the human spirit.

It is easy enough to define what the Commonwealth is not. Indeed this is quite a popular pastime.

I hope that tomorrow we can all, wherever we are, join in expressing our grief at Diana's loss, and gratitude for her all-too-short life. It is a chance to show to the whole world the British nation united in grief and respect.

[To the suggestion that Great Britain might someday want a Republic:] We'll go quietly.

I have been aware all the time that my peoples, spread far and wide throughout every continent and ocean in the world, were united to support me in the task to which I have now been dedicated with such solemnity.

It is as queen of Canada that I am here. Queen of Canada and all Canadians, not just one or two ancestral strains.

Experience shows that great enterprises seldom end with a tidy and satisfactory flourish. Together, we are doing our best to re-establish peace and civil order in the Gulf region, and to help those members of civil and ethnic minorities who continue to suffer through no fault of their own. If we succeed, our military success will have achieved its true objective.

We have all felt those emotions in these last few days. So what I say to you now, as your queen and as a grandmother, I say from my heart.

I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.

Work is the rent you pay for the room you occupy on earth.

I should like to be a horse.

For many, Christmas is also a time for coming together. But for others, service will come first.

For me, heaven is likely to be a bit of a come-down.

It has turned out to be an annus horribilis.

To what greater inspiration and counsel can we turn than to the imperishable truth to be found in this treasure house, the Bible?

1992 is not a year I shall look back on with undiluted pleasure. In the words of one of my more sympathetic correspondents, it hasturned out to be an Annus Horribilis.

These wretched babies don't come until they are ready.

It has perhaps always been the case that the waging of peace is the hardest form of leadership of all.

I don’t like to badmouth people. But I’m the head of a monarchy that began in the ninth century, and I’m apparently more modern than Chris Christie. Look, I know he has to appeal to the crazy right-wingers in his party, but the fact is, he’s not as forward-thinking as an eighty-seven-year-old lady who wears a crown on her head. It’s pathetic.

I hope people will think very carefully about the future.

My husband has quite simply been my strength and stay all these years, and I owe him a debt greater than he would ever claim.

The British Constitution has always been puzzling and always will be.

Madam President, speaking here in Dublin Castle it is impossible to ignore the weight of history, as it was yesterday when you and I laid wreaths at the Garden of Remembrance.