.. that is honour's scorn,
Which challenges itself as honour's born,
And is not like the sire: honours thrive
When rather from our acts we them derive
Than our foregoers: the mere word's a slave,
Debauch'd on every tomb; on every grave
A lying trophy; and as oft is dumb
Where dust and damn'd oblivion is the tomb
Of honour'd bones indeed.
(_All's Well_, II., iii., 130 _seq._)]
The world honours a judge; but if the judge be indebted to his office
and not to his character for the respect that is paid him, he may
deserve no more honour than the criminal in the dock, whom he
sentences to punishment. "A man may see how this world goes with no
eyes," says King Lear to the blind Gloucester. "Look with thine ears;
see how yond justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark, in thine ear;
change places, and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the
thief? Thou hast seen a farmer's dog bark at a beggar? And the
creature run from the cur? There thou mightst behold the great image
of authority; a dog's obeyed in office." "The great image of
authority" is often a brazen idol.
Hereditary rulers form no inconsiderable section of Shakespeare's
_dramatis personae_.
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