Bring me
flesh and bring me wine
Bring me pine logs hither
Thou and I shall see him dine
When we bear them thither.
Page and monarch, forth they went
Forth they went together
Through the rude winds wild lament
And the bitter weather
What does it
mean to be a Good King?
A monarch, a king, is
the sovereign of his subjects. Man, i.e.
his subjects, is a tribal animal. The sovereign
is the physical embodiment of the “tribe”.
A sovereign cares for himself, his subjects, and interacts with other sovereigns and the
subjects of those other sovereigns. If a
king cares more for his subjects, other sovereigns, and their subjects,
than he does for himself, the sovereign may be characterized as a Good King.
The king can care more
about his own subjects than other sovereigns or their subjects. If he does not actively antagonize those other
sovereign or their subjects but is a particularly effective sovereign for his own
subjects, he may be characterized as a Great Sovereign, ( e.g. Charlemagne, "Charles the
Great".)
If he actively antagonizes
those other sovereigns and their subjects, while acting for his own subjects …. (he’s a son of
a bitch, but he’s our son of a bitch.)…. then he is most probably beloved
by his subjects but viewed poorly by others.
Vlad the Impaler, Dracula, was beloved by his own subjects but feared
and hated by other sovereigns and their subjects.
A sovereign can care
more for himself than for his subjects.
If he cares more for himself than his subjects then he almost certainly cares
more for himself than he cares for other sovereigns or their subjects. Those Sovereigns are often given a name that
indicates this condition. (e.g. Ivan the Terrible).
It is appropriate for a
digression into the types of sovereigns.
In nature, sovereigns are almost always dominance sovereigns. That
is the sovereign is chosen by his dominance of others in the tribe, e.g. Nation. If after being chosen by dominance, he acts poorly
for his subjects, he might personally thrive, but his tribe would be weakened. In this case, the tribe will not thrive and Nature
will chose a System, tribal, Optimal solution.
While dominance is almost always how leaders of the pack are chosen in Nature,
mankind has adopted two other ways of choosing sovereigns,. A sovereign may be elected by a set of
his subjects, e.g. the Pope chosen by the college of Cardinals, or the Holy
Roman Emperor was chosen by prince-electors.
It is also possible for an existing sovereign establish a dynasty
and choose his own successor as sovereign.
This may be a close relative ( e.g. the first born son of the sovereign)
or may be an adopted, or designated as an heir, of the sovereign ( e.g. Augustus Caesar was the heir of his
maternal great uncle Julius Caesar.)
It is possible for Dominance
Sovereigns to aspire to become Dynastic Sovereigns. E.g. Kim il-Sung of
North Korean was succeeded by his son, Kim Jong-il, who in turn, designated as
heir, and was succeeded by, his son , Kim Jong-un. If a Dynastic Sovereign dies without a strong heir, wars of succession may result, e.g.
the War of Spanish Succession (1700-1714); the War of Austrian Succession (1740-1748).
While a sovereign who favored
other sovereigns or their subjects over his own, would not be expected by dominance
or elected sovereigns, it can happen with dynastic sovereigns,
who might not necessarily succeed as dominance, or elected sovereigns. Tsarina Catherine the Great was accused of
being a Francophile who valued the French more than her own Russian subjects.
The People of the
United States, its subjects, are, through its Constitution, also its sovereign. By definition, since they are the subjects,
the sovereign can not be terrible. In the
view of its subjects, it is of course Great. It should aspire to be Good.
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