To conclude this study of Sir John Fortescue and the governance of England several topics will be considered that throw light on his character, in so far as it can be recovered, the ideological, cultural and political climate in which he worked, the impact this had upon his thought and the claim made by Chrimes that he was ‘the authentic voice of English character’.

It is possible to get some idea of Fortescue's character both from his writings and from the documents which record his career and business dealings. He was able, flexible, hard-working and hard-headed; professionally and politically he acted pragmatically. He seems to have been conventionally religious and was anxious that what he wrote on the succession question should not violate canon law: he may have translated at least part of Alain Chartier's Treatise of Hope. His relationships with female members of his family seem to have been determined by profit and loss rather than by affection. Both his marriages were arranged with heiresses in areas where he aspired to build up his career prospects. His daughter Maud was the victim of a marriage which he saw as a means of aggrandising his family, but his attitudes in this respect were typical of his time. Fortescue was sociable, liking wine, good dinners and the company to be found at the Inns of Court. The Inns were crucial to the preservation of the English character of the common law:

The Year Books testify that the exchanges between the justices and sergeants in the common law courts were sometimes humorous and a few of Fortescue's judgments seem distinctly light-hearted, a side of his character that his writings, including the De Natura, also show. His major works were produced in a pressurised atmosphere: the defeat of Lancaster 1460–3 obliged him to issue ever more elaborate justifications for a usurpation that took place sixty years earlier.