Tea at Trianon: The Attraction to Monarchy

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, May 13, 2023

The Attraction to Monarchy

From Crisis:

The French monarchy has often been described as absolute, but that word poorly describes the actual regime. Many government responsibilities lay beyond the authority of the throne. While the French king was the only source of legislation for the entire realm, the king’s decrees only became efficacious when they were registered by the Parlement of Paris; thus, at the very least, the wishes of the king could be delayed. Both the British and French monarchies had to obtain the approval of the Parliament and Estates General, respectively, to collect new taxes.
The ideology of popular sovereignty could also be invoked to limit the ruler. The authority of the Roman emperor derived from the Roman people. The Senate played an important role in the formation of the empire in the first century B.C. What essentially happened was that the old republican magistracies were invested in a single magistrate, namely the imperator or the princeps, by acts of the representative body of the Roman people, namely the Senate.
In the Middle Ages, kings were in theory elective. Succession to the throne came partially by dynasty, that is, upon the death or deposition of a ruler, a close relative usually succeeded. However, the successful claimant had to obtain the approval of the princes of the realm.
In 1356, the Golden Bull ordained that the ruler of the German Empire had to win the election of the seven electors (four secular princes, three bishops). After the long reign of Frederick III (1440-1493), the imperial throne remained in Habsburg hands until 1918. In the meantime, however, several successions required that eldest surviving sons not inherit the throne. (Read more.)

The Catholic sacramentals of royalty. From Aleteia:

Blessed oil is still used in the Catholic Church during Baptism, Confirmation, Anointing of the Sick and Holy Orders, and has a rich history, steeped in biblical symbolism. King Charles was consecrated with oil that was from Jerusalem, cementing the biblical use of oil to consecrate kings.
The Archbishop in Jerusalem presents the oil in this moment, symbolically completing the oil’s journey and helping to emphasize the strong historic link between the Coronation, The Old Testament and the Holy Land, drawing on the imagery of the oil and the narrative thread that runs from King Saul.
(Read more.)

From Dr. Anthony Esolen at Word and Song:

Crowns, crowns! “My strong imagination sees a crown / Dropping upon thy head,” says Antonio to Sebastian, one man of sin to another, in The Tempest. All Sebastian has to do is to murder his brother Alonso, the King of Naples, in his sleep. It will not come to pass; it is a phantasm of a diseased mind. But isn’t that often the case, that the crown neither confers authority, nor is it a sign of authority, but it is rather a mockery, even a punishment? Think of the pathetic last king of Judah, Zedekiah, who wasn’t particularly wicked, but who didn’t care to listen to the constant warnings of Jeremiah, either. He was led off to captivity in Babylon, but not before the Babylonians slew his sons in front of him and then put his eyes out. It would have been better for Zedekiah had he been a mere vinedresser or a plowman.

Yet I think we can no more remove from our hearts the idea of a crowned king than we can remove the very ideal of nobility, power, wisdom, fatherly care, and self-denial combined in one man. An Indian chief wears a headdress; and if he is a good man, it will weigh heavy upon him. We see him, just as we see a painting of King Arthur seated with his knights of the Round Table, and we understand it immediately. It’s the president, the prime minister, the party leader, and the county commissioners who need explaining. Maybe we can also understand that when Jesus was crowned with thorns, it wasn’t as much of a mockery as the soldiers thought it would be, because in this world of ours, a good king must feel the thorns more sharply than he sees the gold. (Read more.)