Her work done, the sword passed to the one undoubted King, the lady returns to the lake. #Coronation #PennyMordaunt pic.twitter.com/WA7lNRj85l
— Angry People in Local Newspapers (@angrypiln) May 6, 2023
For those not following, the woman you saw bearing the sword in today’s proceedings is Penny Mordaunt MP, twice-failed candidate to be leader of the Conservative Party, whose previous peak as a search term on Google Images was when she did a belly flop in a TV diving contest. In 2019 she held the post of Secretary of State for Defence for 85 days. When Boris Johnson became prime minister and promptly fired her, she probably thought her days of exerting the traditional politician’s privilege of being photographed in close proximity to weaponry were over. But having landed the somewhat-ancient office of Lord President of the Council (“Unlike some of the other Great Officers of State, the office of Lord President is not very old”, sneers Wikipedia because it only dates from 1529), she got to carry the king’s sword and at least look capable of chopping off the heads of any enemies of the realm who might try to reach him via her.
Dennis the Peasant had a point. It’s all a bit daft. But I think history shows that when the illogical mess of tradition is stripped away from a people, what they find to replace it is rarely pure reason.
The Lord President is not as ‘Conservative’ as the name of her party suggests, it seems given what emerged during her leadership campaigns. However, she has served (and might still do) in the Royal Naval Reserve, so she has come in some way close to a military life.
What struck me about today was (AFAIK) the RAF could not put even one bomber up over London in friendly skies despite having months of prior notice of the event, yet in 1943 could put 1,000 over one city in Germany in one night. Perhaps a deliberate decision though?
I would also note that my local town was extremely quiet during the event, so it seems to have generated enormous interest in the good folk of England, much to the Left’s chagrin.
So we now have an adulterer enthroned and consecrated as the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, for whom the Seventh Commandment was too much, but at least unlike the first Supreme Guvnor, the Sixth remains honoured.
“[T]he RAF could not put even one bomber up over London in friendly skies despite having months of prior notice of the event, yet in 1943 could put 1,000 over one city in Germany in one night.”
Actual existential, heavy-metal, total war does tend to focus the mind though.
Anyone looking for even a semblance of rationality to be demonstrated in any aspect of human affairs is doomed to disappointment.
I developed the thesis, long ago, that every sentient being has to possess some form of irrational belief; if they do not, they simply cannot function in the face of existential doubt and the sheer horror of existence within this vale of tears. If they don’t fill that need with something, then there’s a vacancy there for just about any lunatic belief to insert itself.
Which is why you have the phenomenon of proudly atheist former Catholics and Mormons that will describe to you in loving detail how each and every one of their “healing crystals” work for them, fighting an absurd number of maladies.
I further speculate that established religion fills a role as a stabilizing agent, providing continuity and cohesion. Take that away, and what you have is a perfect environment for incubating madness.
“King Charles III will hold almost no power in Canada. Yet that is the point: it’s the very powerlessness of the monarch that matters.”
– Christopher Dummitt
A monarchical system does have the stellar advantage of keeping the political class in their place. You just know in their hearts they all want to be el Presidente.
“I further speculate that established religion fills a role as a stabilizing agent, providing continuity and cohesion. Take that away, and what you have is a perfect environment for incubating madness.”
“When men stop believing in God they don’t believe in nothing; they believe in anything.”
– G.K. Chesterton (attrib.)
Having sampled the coronation on YT one thing that struck me is “can’t you learn your lines?” All of them had cue cards, and they all read from the cards. FFS, he’s only had sixty years to prepare! I mean the whole point of this pomp and circumstance is to make them look powerful and to not look at the man behind the curtain. And you can’t even learn your lines, or walk assertively and boldly? Let’s just say King Charles III does not at all remind me at all of Edward I, or Henry VIII.
And as to concerns for his adulterous relationship and being the Supreme Governor of the CoE, one must remember the purpose and foundation of the Church of England — build on the family values of Henry VIII. So Charles III may not be as might as that Tudor tyrant, but I think by most measures he was more moral.
However, the music was very nice, and the wayward Duke of Sussex managed to avoid the tower by keeping his foolishness in check. So all in all I think you’d have to call it a good day.
Penny of Mordor
I am not a fan of the book of Penny Mordant (although I rather suspect that the co-author, a leftist, dominated that work), but the lady played her role today well – I think they all did well today.
God Save The King.
I saw only snippets of today’s brou-ha-ha, but enough to note that KC III has, to my total amazement, adopted all the nervous tics that characterized his great-uncle – hand in pocket, fiddling with his tie and cuffs, fussing with his lapels, ASF. I wonder what brought that on?
llater,
llamas
Semi-relatedly, last week, while pootling about Youtube, I came across a claim that Charles’s age at taking the throne is older than every previous king’s age since William the Conqueror at his death. That didn’t sound quite right, so I did a bit of research.
It turned out that the claim was mostly true with 2-1/2 exceptions:
Charles is 74.
George II died at 76.
George III died at 81.
Edward VIII died at 77, but he was king for only a few months in 1936.
My apologies – the name is “Penny Mordaunt”, I meant no offence to the lady.
“I further speculate that established religion fills a role as a stabilizing agent, providing continuity and cohesion. Take that away, and what you have is a perfect environment for incubating madness.”
But you could reasonably argue that any established school of thought fills a role as a stabilising agent. A philosophy, political views, science, literature, ardently following a sports team or a rock band, aggravated stamp collecting. Anything that forms a big enough interest in your life will provide a point of view to operate from. Religion may provide such a point of view… but religion capitalises on this very human desire for a stabilising view point rather than the generation by some divine source. Otherwise how do you explain all the interest in the Coronation spectacle by people of little religion?
(Laughs in Henry VIII)
Call me pedantic, but I don’t think it is too pedantic, when discussing politics, to point out that (contra Dennis) strange women* distributing swords was never meant to be a basis for any system of government.
* whether lying in ponds or not
Rather, it was meant to be a principle of legitimization.
Every establishment needs a way to legitimize itself, which can be Divine Right (Mandate of Heaven, in Chinese terms), a social contract, the General Will, a Rawlsian veil of ignorance, or any sort of BS.
I do think that there is at least one valid principle of legitimization:
There is always going to be a ruling class, even in an anarchist society such as Viking Iceland. The best that we can hope for, is a system of checks+balances (such as in Viking Iceland) that limits the power of the ruling class.
Any such system is legitimized by the very fact that it limits the power of the ruling class.
And Dennis did advocate such a system, right before criticizing farcical aquatic ceremonies!
Snorri is correct.
The meaning of the service is that there is a law (right and wrong) beyond the will of any ruler or rulers – and that law speaks to what used to be called “the nature of man” that we have souls as well as bodies.
As for the idea that the ruler is there to uphold the law, not make the law, that goes back a very long way indeed (it was an ancient idea even in 877 when Charles the Bald, King of France, formally admitted the limits to his lawful power – the things, such as take land from one family and give it to another, that it would be a crime for any ruler or rulers to do).
And, in the end, it is a pledge of sacrifice – that the King (or whoever the person or persons are) are prepared to take the responsibility of death, their own death, for the nation.
King Alfred (an ancestor of King Charles down the female line – due to the marriage of King Henry the First) did not need anyone to tell about this as he organised resistance in the marshes of Somerset – Alfred was no stranger to such names as the Emperor Marcus Aurelius (centuries before his own time) or “The Consolations of Philosophy” by Boethius.
As a Japanese philosopher (his name escapes me – he was some centuries ago) “no learning without arms” (for culture can not survive if it is not defended) and “no arms without learning” as the uncultured man with weapons is just a beast with fangs (the conscript armies created in the 1870s violated this).
It is often said that King Charles the first thought he could do anything he liked – but that is not true. Even when his death was certain he refused to concede that he had ever held such a view – let along plead for mercy (to plead for mercy for himself would have been a violation of his Coronation Oath of sacrifice – to ask for mercy for himself, rather than grant mercy to others, would have “unKinged” him in a way that being killed could not).
Charles the First both in his book, and in the short statement he made before his death that he had always stood for liberty – in the sense of those laws by which the lives and good of the people be most their own.
Did he make terrible mistakes? Yes he did. But he certainly did NOT hold the opinion (the opinion that he, as ruler, could do anything he liked) that is now attributed to him.
My reading of Chesterton’s (via JJM) quote was not the stabilization of the *individual*, but that of the community, the tribe and the larger society.
Friedrich Nietzsche wrote:
To an extent a political philosophy–like Communism or Fascism, or Libertarianism can fill that void…Of course the first two worked *so* well, and the latter is catching on like wildfire, no?
I see that I need to clarify what I was getting at…
The key thing isn’t something you believe in; the key thing is something that is fundamentally irrational, beyond reason, that you believe in.
I’ve long observed that you have a much easier time talking politics with people that have religion in their lives… That void of irrational belief is filled; you can argue facts and change minds, when they go to church on Sundays. Try that with an “atheist” true-believer leftist, and watch what happens: They have, without recognizing it, substituted their leftist ideology for that which filled the irrational belief void. You can’t argue with them; any evidence, any fact presented? Rejected, much as though you were trying to convince a good Catholic that the Trinity was a figment of their delusion.
I believe in a lot of things, most of which are things I’ve seen the evidence for and reasoned my way into believing in, taking the word of others who’ve done the work. That’s rational belief; you get to that state through experience and evidence, often trusting the work of others.
Irrational belief is the opposite; you pick out something, at some point in your life, and you believe in that, with no evidence, no reason, just sheer unadulterated faith. Whether it’s the Easter Bunny or Karl Marx, it makes no difference; you’ve no real evidence or experience backing your belief system up.
If you look around and talk to people, they’ve all got this going. Friend of mine is utterly and totally convinced that pit bulls are just big, lovable dogs, misunderstood by one and all. She’s been bitten a couple of dozen times by her “rescues”, and I live in fear of someone telling me she’s gotten her dumb ass eaten alive by the pack she maintains. Irrational belief, for her, is in the innate doggy goodness of a bunch of canines whose selection against gnawing on humans has been short-circuited. She’s no more sane than the average leftoid I run into, on this subject, and also shares a lot of mental topography with the Jehovah’s Witnesses I have coming to my door.
Interestingly enough, people simply rebrand their opponents arguments, and claim them for themselves! You can’t study clairvoyance in the American Government, but Remote viewing, the very same thing, sounds so much more modern! And, at one time, Christian Scientists had a ‘God of the Gaps’- whatever science had not explored, that was where God was directing things. Now, scientists go round shouting ‘Multiverse!’ if some things seem inexplicable. (Why is the number for gravity so fine-tuned that it allows our type of life? Multiverse!)