“Do not you think that if I were about any king, proposing good laws to him, and endeavouring to root out all the cursed seeds of evil that I found in him, I should either be turned out of his court, or, at least, be laughed at for my pains? For instance, what could I signify if I were about the King of France, and were called into his cabinet council, where several wise men, in his hearing, were proposing many expedients; as, by what arts and practices Milan may be kept, and Naples, that has so often slipped out of their hands, recovered; how the Venetians, and after them the rest of Italy, may be subdued; and then how Flanders, Brabant, and all Burgundy, and some other kingdoms which he has swallowed already in his designs, may be added to his empire? One proposes a league with the Venetians, to be kept as long as he finds his account in it, and that he ought to communicate counsels with them, and give them some share of the spoil till his success makes him need or fear them less, and then it will be easily taken out of their hands; another proposes the hiring the Germans and the securing the Switzers by pensions; another proposes the gaining the Emperor by money, which is omnipotent with him; another proposes a peace with the King of Arragon, and, in order to cement it, the yielding up the King of Navarre’s pretensions; another thinks that the Prince of Castile is to be wrought on by the hope of an alliance, and that some of his courtiers are to be gained to the French faction by pensions. The hardest point of all is, what to do with England; a treaty of peace is to be set on foot, and, if their alliance is not to be depended on, yet it is to be made as firm as possible, and they are to be called friends, but suspected as enemies: therefore the Scots are to be kept in readiness to be let loose upon England on every occasion; and some banished nobleman is to be supported underhand (for by the League it cannot be done avowedly) who has a pretension to the crown, by which means that suspected prince may be kept in awe. Now when things are in so great a fermentation, and so many gallant men are joining counsels how to carry on the war, if so mean a man as I should stand up and wish them to change all their counsels—to let Italy alone and stay at home, since the kingdom of France was indeed greater than could be well governed by one man; that therefore he ought not to think of adding others to it; and if, after this, I should propose to them the resolutions of the Achorians, a people that lie on the south-east of Utopia, who long ago engaged in war in order to add to the dominions of their prince another kingdom, to which he had some pretensions by an ancient alliance: this they conquered, but found that the trouble of keeping it was equal to that by which it was gained; that the conquered people were always either in rebellion or exposed to foreign invasions, while they were obliged to be incessantly at war, either for or against them, and consequently could never disband their army; that in the meantime they were oppressed with taxes, their money went out of the kingdom, their blood was spilt for the glory of their king without procuring the least advantage to the people, who received not the smallest benefit from it even in time of peace; and that, their manners being corrupted by a long war, robbery and murders everywhere abounded, and their laws fell into contempt; while their king, distracted with the care of two kingdoms, was the less able to apply his mind to the interest of either. When they saw this, and that there would be no end to these evils, they by joint counsels made an humble address to their king, desiring him to choose which of the two kingdoms he had the greatest mind to keep, since he could not hold both; for they were too great a people to be governed by a divided king, since no man would willingly have a groom that should be in common between him and another. Upon which the good prince was forced to quit his new kingdom to one of his friends (who was not long after dethroned), and to be contented with his old one. To this I would add that after all those warlike attempts, the vast confusions, and the consumption both of treasure and of people that must follow them, perhaps upon some misfortune they might be forced to throw up all at last; therefore it seemed much more eligible that the king should improve his ancient kingdom all he could, and make it flourish as much as possible; that he should love his people, and be beloved of them; that he should live among them, govern them gently and let other kingdoms alone, since that which had fallen to his share was big enough, if not too big, for him:—pray, how do you think would such a speech as this be heard?”--Thomas More, Utopia, Book 1
In context, Raphael Hythloday is explaining why he rejects the possibility to become an expert adviser to kings. These do not (recall) welcome truthful advice. Enlightened despotism is ruled out because a range of mechanisms (group-think, status seeking, and misaligned incentives, war-profiting, etc.) prevent explicit truth from having a seat at the decision-making table. And, perhaps, in a zero-sum international environment, the advocate of peace and self-limitation should not even expect to be heard.
My interest here is in the little vignette about the Achorians. In the course of his discussion with the character Thomas More, Hythloday uses three such vignettes in Book 1. All three involve relatively isolated lands.* (This is also true of Utopia and Great Britain.) All three examples involve internal or external mechanisms by which royal authority is constrained and made to submit to law.** Two of the examples, Achoria and Macaria are said to be not far from Utopia; in light of what follows in Book 2 -- where we learn the Utopians have a sphere of influence --, it can be speculated that the good order found in Achoria and Macaria may well be the product of Utopian policy.
The vignette fits a larger pacific argument unfolded in Utopia. War is associated with the desire for glory. But glory is treated as "petty pride."+ The contrast is with contentment and comfort (this is emphasized in the earlier vignette about the Polylerites). War and occupation of others is treated as a source of many evils not the least for undermining the rule of domestic law. Exporting war means simultaneously undermining domestic order and corrupting morality.
Now, I don't mean to suggest More (the author) endorses any of Hythloday's arguments. Hythloday's name (nonsense peddler) does not inspire confidence; he also exhibits some contradictory claims. More's own (recall) rhetorical stance is oblique. But the vignettes may open to the reader vistas that would otherwise be occluded.
The most striking feature of the vignette is that (royal) authority is grounded -- as David Hume, Adam Smith, and Madison would emphasize -- in the good opinion of the people. The people are not, as Kant would suggest, presented as naturally pacific. But it is implied that they will not tolerate endless troubles, and that at some point authority must engage with their interest. In a strikingly gendered metaphor, the king is presented as a bride who must give his/her undivided attention in serving her masculine gendered demos. We can discern her the way (recall) in which (and here) later democratic theory presupposes patriarchy.
*I thank my student Fatiha Panjwani for raising a question about this. The subsequent class discussion was very fruitful, and some of the joint insights are reflected in this post.
**Two of the examples also involve a theory of optimal size of the realm to allow for proper rule/governance.
+This suggests there is a good, magnanimous pride.
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