DR. FRANK CRANE’S DAILY EDITORIAL

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 189, 31 October 1927, Page 14

DR. FRANK CRANE’S DAILY EDITORIAL

KINGS CAN’T DO AS THEY PLEASE

(Copyright , 1921) gHORTLY after he had been made King of Rumania, little Michael was playing with his toys. He had been told he was not like other people. It was said to him. “You can do as you will and others must agree it is right.” While he was playing the nurse came and informed him that he must have his face washed. He didn’t want his face washed. He was busy playing. He said: “I am king now and I can do as I wish. If I want to play with my toys I will—l have that right.” This is in line with the popular notion and also the infantile notion that kings can do as they please; the higher the station a man occupies the more free he is. Nothing is farther from the truth. * The more money you have, the higher your position and altogether the more important personage you are, the more you are hampered by convention. King’s sons and daughters cannot marry people they want to, but their consorts are chosen for them by reasons of State. Think of having to marry and live with the homely Princess Hogenheimer when you hanker after beautiful Mary Brown with violet eyes. And that is not the worst of it. Somebody looks after your food and lets you eat only certain things. You are allowed to drink only so muchf \ou may have 43 uniforms, but somebody picks them out for you and tells you when you must wear them. Wotan, in the Wagner operas, was the supreme king, yet somehow he was controlled by the writings upon his spear. As far as that is concerned, the Creator cannot do as He pleases. There is one thing we can do that He can’t. We can do wrong. The Creator can do no wrong; He can’t make mistakes; He can’t neglect His duty. Man is endowed with the divine privilege of doing wrong, of committing error and of soldiering on his job. As far as we can see man, the lower down in the scale of the social ladder he is the truer it is, he constitutes the only personage who can do as he pleases. No. If you want liberty, freedom and the right to follow your own sweet will, stay down. Don’t climb. For the higher you go in the social scale the more you are circumvented.