Part 1 (2/2)
”Is my father a man?”
”a.s.suredly! The question is superfluous.”
”What makes him a King?”
”Royal birth and the hereditary right to his great position.”
”Then if man is in a condition of supremacy over the rest of creation, a king is more than a man if he is allowed to rule men?”
”Sir, pardon me!--a king is not more than a man, but men choose him as their ruler because he is worthy.”
”In what way is he worthy? Simply because he is born as I am, heir to a throne?”
”Precisely.”
”He might be an idiot or a cripple, a fool or a coward,--he would still be King?”
”Most indubitably.”
”So that if he were a madman, he would continue to hold supremacy over a nation, though his groom might be sane?”
”Your Royal Highness pursues the question with an unwise flippancy;”--remonstrated the professor with a pained, forced smile.
”If an idiot or a madman were unfortunately born to a throne, a regency would be appointed to control state affairs, but the heir would, in spite of natural incapability, remain the lawful king.”
”A strange sovereignty!” said the young prince carelessly. ”And a still stranger patience in the people who would tolerate it! Yet over all men,--kings, madmen, and idiots alike,--there is another ruling force, called G.o.d?”
”There is a force,” admitted the professor dubiously--”But in the present forward state of things it would not be safe to attempt to explain the nature of that force, and for the benefit of the illiterate ma.s.ses we call it G.o.d. A national wors.h.i.+p of something superior to themselves has always been proved politic and necessary for the people.
I have not at any time resolved myself as to why it should be so; but so it is.”
”Then man, despite his 'supremacy' must have something more supreme than himself to keep him in order, if it be only a fetish wherewith to tickle his imagination?” suggested the prince with a touch of satire,--”Even kings must bow, or pretend to bow, to the King of kings?”
”Sir, you have expressed the fact with felicity;” replied the professor gravely--”His Majesty, your august father, attends public wors.h.i.+p with punctilious regularity, and you are accustomed to accompany him. It is a rule which you will find necessary to keep in practice, as an example to your subjects when you are called upon to reign.”
The young man raised his eyebrows deprecatingly, with a slight ironical smile, and dropped the subject. But the learned professor as in duty bound, reported the conversation to his pupil's father; with the additional observation that he feared, he very humbly and respectfully feared, that the developing mind of the prince appeared undesirably disposed towards discursive philosophies, which were wholly unnecessary for the position he was destined to occupy. Whereupon the King took his son to task on the subject with a mingling of kindness and humour.
”Do not turn philosopher!” he said--”For philosophy will not so much content you with life, as with death! Philosophy will chill your best impulses and most generous enthusiasms,--it will make you over-cautious and doubtful of your friends,--it will cause you to be indifferent to women in the plural, but it will hand you over, a weak and helpless victim to the _one_ woman,--when she comes,--as she is bound to come.
There is no one so hopelessly insane as a philosopher in love! Love women, but not _a_ woman!”
”In so doing I should follow the wisest of examples,--yours, Sir!”
replied the prince with a familiarity more tender than audacious, for his father was a man of fine presence and fascinating manner, and knew well the extent of his power to charm and subjugate the fairer s.e.x,--”But I have a fancy that love,--if it exists anywhere outside the dreams of the poets,--is unknown to kings.”
The monarch bent his brows frowningly, and his eyes were full of a deep and bitter melancholy.
”You mistake!” he said slowly--”Love,--and by that name I mean a wholly different thing from Pa.s.sion,--comes to kings as to commoners,--but whereas the commoner may win it if he can, the king must reject it. But it comes,--and leaves a blank in the proudest life when it goes!”
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