No one shall make me fail in my duty to you.
My Lord, I make so bold as to write to Your Highness to ask your consent to Her Imperial Majesty’s intentions with regard to me. I can assure you that your will shall always be my own, and that no one shall make me fail in my duty to you. Since I can find almost no difference between the Orthodox faith and the Lutheran, I am resolved (with all due regard to Your Highness’s gracious instructions) to change, and shall send you my confession of faith on the first day. I may flatter myself that Your Highness will be pleased with it and I remain, while I live, with profound respect, my lord, Your Highness’s very obedient and very humble daughter and servant. Sophia.
This was a letter Sophia aka Catherine the second wrote to her father.
Q1: Could anyone explain the sentence in blue? what was the duty she referred to?
Q2: would Britons consider themselves as servants to the Queen in the UK today?
Thanks!
Top answer
1. This excerpt does not explain what duty that might be. You have to understand it from the whole context and a knowledge of the relationship of the people involved.
- 1.
- This excerpt does not explain what duty that might be.
- You have to understand it from the whole context and a knowledge of the relationship of the people involved.
- 2.
- No.
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1. This excerpt does not explain what duty that might be. You have to understand it from the whole context and a knowledge of the relationship of the people involved.
2. No.
"I remain ... your servant", or similar wording, is an old-fashioned formal polite way of signing off a letter that does not imply literal servitude.
0iclearwaterno one shall make me fail in my duty to you.
I take this to mean
I will do whatever you want me to do, and I will not allow anyone to persuade me to do otherwise.
CJ
0
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