Mary, kept in confinement by her Protestant cousin, was frequently at the centre of Catholic-inspired plots to remove Elizabeth from her throne. In religious matters, Cecil was a sincere and thoughtful Protestant who shared the queen’s desire to bring the moderate Catholics within an all-embracing Church of England.

Nevertheless, her religious In June 1572 CE Cecil was made a member of the Order of the Garter and in July he was appointed the Lord Treasurer, a position he would hold until his death in 1598 CE.

William Cecil was born on September 13th 1520. The great statesman was laid to rest in a magnificent tomb topped by an effigy representing him as a medieval knight in full armour (which was then already long obsolete).

In 1547 CE William began to move in more powerful circles when he joined the staff of Edward Seymour, the Duke of Somerset who was in all but name the regent for Edward VI.

In 1543, Cecil became a Member of Parliament and quickly developed a reputation as a fine administrator.

Planned by the Duke of Norfolk and a Florentine banker, Robert di Ridolfi, the conspirators hoped to join forces with Catholic Spain to mount an invasion of England and then crown Mary queen. Last modified June 10, 2020. preferences were conservative, and her preferred resolution would have been the Elizabeth may have intended the impetuous and radical-thinking Dudley to act as a counterbalance to the much more conservative Cecil and vice-versa. It was during this first stint in government that Cecil was knighted. Ancient History Encyclopedia Limited is a non-profit company registered in the United Kingdom. Spain was expanding in the New World and Cecil was appreciative of the potential value such a colony had. This rivalry was not only one of ideas but also one of courtier and statesman. but he was doomed to disappointment. Cecil in one sense was a Puritan – he recognised that the clergy at the lower end of Church hierarchy had to be improved if they were to serve the function that was intended.

Cecil took charge of organising the whole venture.

legitimacy or otherwise, it would be hard for her to accept the Roman Catholic Please note that content linked from this page may have different licensing terms. Prior to the meeting of her first Parliament, the law was License. One area Cecil was never successful was to convince his queen to marry and settle the problem of her successor. observed at Elizabeth’s court and elsewhere, and the Catholic Mass continued, His son, Robert, was to have an equally successful political career under James I.eval(ez_write_tag([[336,280],'historylearningsite_co_uk-large-mobile-banner-2','ezslot_17',118,'0','0'])); Sir William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, died on August 4th 1598. The Letters of Lord Burghley, William Cecil, to His Son Sir Robert Cecil... Memoirs Of The Life And Administration Of The Right Honourable William... Memoirs of the life and administration of the Right Honourable William... Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike. William Cecil was born in Lincolnshire in 1520 CE, the son of a Welsh minor noble who had gained prominence by supporting the first Tudor king, Henry VII of England (r. 1485-1509 CE). Whilst Elizabeth never discussed her Cecil knew that the tax system was unfairly weighted against the poor and when this combined with poor harvests in the mid-1580s CE, there were popular protests and riots. although Elizabeth showed her rejection of transubstantiation by walking out of

Lord Burghley was Secretary of State for both Edward VI of England (r. 1547-1553 CE) and Elizabeth. William Cecil: Bibliophile & Map Collector, Burghley: William Cecil at the Court of Elizabeth I. Cecil believed that if France felt threatened on both her northern and southern borders, she would be less of a threat to England.