Radicalism is as British as tea and cakes, as much a part of our make-up as monarchy and football. It will never have its own jubilees, palaces or honours system.
Monarchy
In Mesopotamia or Egypt, for example, the monarch had a god-like religious status. But this is not the case in Judaism. So that notion that religion can go on, when all the markers of power and trappings of monarchy disappear, ultimately serves the endurance of Judaism very well.
Just as an individual of pre-eminent worth transforms democracy into a monarchy of the best man, even so the rule of one man, if in all things it has an eye to the common welfare, is democracy.
What royal families are very good at doing is surviving and reinventing themselves. That’s true whether it’s a constitutional monarchy in Britain or an authoritarian monarchy.
It seems to me that Sotheby’s is very much like the British monarchy: an old and apparently very venerable institution which is in fact very nimble on its feet, an institution invested with a great deal more self-interest than the public image would suggest.
Of the various forms of government which have prevailed in the world, an hereditary monarchy seems to present the fairest scope for ridicule.
I am a vigilant monarchist. I want to see things evolve. The direction the monarchy seems to be moving in – towards a more mainland-European model – is one I would feel sympathetic about.
The Emperor Napoleon, ascending gradually from his post of national magistrate to seat himself upon a throne without limits, seems to have wished to punish, as for the abuse of republican reforms, by making us feel all the weight of absolute monarchy.
A political revolution must proceed simultaneously with the nationalist revolution. When we overthrow the Manchu regime, we will achieve not only a nationalist revolution against the Manchus but also a political revolution against monarchy. They are not to be carried out at two different times.
The state is nothing but an instrument of opression of one class by another – no less so in a democratic republic than in a monarchy.