At first thought, the hardest to understand is why the Spanish should have adopted the myth about the storm. Naturally the English welcomed a material proof that God was with them, but why should the Spanish accept the view that God was against them, that their fleet had contended in vain not against men but against the winds and waves of God? It is only at first thought that it is hard to understand. It is always easier to accept defeat at the hands of God than at the hands of men, and the Judaeo-Christian tradition is rich in resources for explaining apparently irrational behaviour on the part of the Deity.

Garrett Mattingly, The Defeat of the Spanish A…, loc. 881