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The Man Who Would Not Be King
Douglas Murray has moved on from the weekly “Things Worth Remembering” column in The Free Press. But others are stepping in. This week’s column by Benjamin Carlson, “The Haunting Truth of Dostoyevsky’s Demons,” is worth a read.
Carlson relates how Demons (also published under the titles The Devils and The Possessed) first impressed him at the age of 16 or 17:
I remember where I was: the rain-spattered porch in the Poconos where my family spent summers. Thick droplets of water thundered on the leaves. And the pages came to life with that revelatory intensity I associate with only a few books in my life…
There was a rumble of thunder. Cool air. The dark summer day enclosed and amplified the raging energy of that weird Russian meganovel—Dostoyevsky’s third masterpiece to be hammered out in an astonishing sprint of genius nearly 20 years after his release from a Siberian gulag. Then and now, Demons is an unsettled, imbalanced, ungainly book that doesn’t even have an agreed-upon name. And I was intoxicated by it.
That was the post-9/11 era. America was wounded and angry. I didn’t have the words for it then, but Demons gave me a shape for what I felt—not an explanation of politics, but an intuition for what happens when ideas burn too hot. They do not merely inspire the people who hold them. They annihilate them.
I’ve read it several times since: during the financial crisis, before the 2016 election, during the Covid pandemic, and now again at age 40. I don’t read it as a political treatise. I read it the way others might visit a grave.
[Emphasis added]
“I read it the way others might visit a grave.” Now that sentence is a keeper.
Carlson describes the novel and quotes some passages to illustrate the central point: “Idealistic movements often turn into their opposites.”
[T]he passage I think about all the time, spoken by a theorist named Shigalyov, who has developed a rigorous system for liberating mankind.
His conclusion?
“I got entangled in my own data, and my conclusion directly contradicts the original idea I start from. Starting from unlimited freedom, I conclude with unlimited despotism. I will add, however, that there is no other solution to the social formula but mine.”
The conspirators laugh him down. But it’s no joke. It’s the keystone of the book. The desire to free mankind ends in tyranny. Freedom requires order. Order becomes control. Control becomes violence. The circle closes.
Carlson concludes:
We always assume moral warnings are meant for others. But Dostoyevsky doesn’t let you off that easily. The warning is not about your enemies. It’s about you.
Every movement that burns hot enough will attract opportunists, zealots, and eventually, destroyers. Even the most righteous cause can be hollowed out from within.
And so I keep reading Demons. Again and again. Not because I enjoy the darkness, but because I fear it. Because I see signs of it, flickering at the edge of things. And because somewhere, in the rain on the leaves, I can hear the warning.
Carlson’s and Dostoyevsky’s words ring true. So what is the way out? Is the best we can hope for to live in the “sweet spot” of the cycle? The answer is also the improbable: The only king, leader, or president, who can hold to the sweet spot, is the one who does not want to be a king, a leader, or a president.
Long before Dostoyevsky, the same point was set out in the Bible: 1 Samuel 8 (New King James Version) —
Now it came to pass when Samuel was old that he made his sons judges over Israel. 2 The name of his firstborn was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah; they were judges in Beersheba. 3 But his sons did not walk in his ways; they turned aside after dishonest gain, took bribes, and perverted justice.
4 Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, 5 and said to him, “Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.”
6 But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” So Samuel prayed to the Lord. 7 And the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them. 8 According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day—with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also. 9 Now therefore, heed their voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, and show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them.”
10 So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who asked him for a king. 11 And he said, “This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots. 12 He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. 14 And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. 15 He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants. 16 And he will take your male servants, your female servants, your finest [a]young men, and your donkeys, and put them to his work. 17 He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants. 18 And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the Lord will not hear you in that day.”
19 Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, “No, but we will have a king over us, 20 that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles.”
21 And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he repeated them in the hearing of the Lord. 22 So the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed their voice, and make them a king.”
The safety of the people lies in the internalizing of a moral order, observing subsidiarity in a disciplined way, and struggling to balance order and chaos. The only safe leader is the one who humbly takes on an unwanted burden.
Published in General
Wonderful post, thanks.
Dostoyevsky’s genius continues to amaze. His understanding of human nature and its predictability was prodigal and transcended borders and centuries. I miss Douglas Murray’s posts on that site, but there have been a few well worth reading, though not all.
In Republic, Socrates and friends discuss the philosopher-kings. They have a number of reasons it’s ok to make them govern.
They’d rather just do philosophy.
And anyone remember what Aslan said to Prince Caspian?
C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian (Chronicles of Narnia, #2)
It may be that what made the American Revolution a success was the subsidiarity that was at work in a unique way in the colonies. Washington, according to some accounts, was a reluctant President.
The dilemma that we find ourselves in today is that government office must be sought with a great effort of will and resources at most levels. Even at the lowest levels of government we often find ourselves dealing with controlling personalities.
Does this trace back to the lack of an internalizing of a moral order? How might that be regained?
It traces back to the Declaration of Independence. While Europe accepted the primacy of God it also believed in the “divine right of kings”. The Declaration challenged that and asserted that people “consented” to their governments, not that their government was determined by God. But the Declaration also alluded to a moral code that must exist if, unlike the rest of Creation, humans had “unalienable rights” given to them by the Creator and which government, even if one of the people’s consent, could not abridge. This latter point is key because “rights” exist above democracy. But when you deny God, when you make government into a god, you make the moral code “democratic” at best and despotic at worst. So the first step in the process is the restoration of a Supreme Being. It’s a tricky one while maintaining pluralism because you need to not insist on a detailed description of God, his intentions and his expectations. But government must be dethroned as God and morality cannot be subject to a vote even as it must be internalized by at least of a majority fron whom government gets its consent.
The story from Samuel was the inverse. The people asked that God (through Samuel) give them a king. God told Samuel to bow to the “consent” of the governed, even as (so Samuel warned) a king would not uphold their individual rights.
Which suggests the question – what is the proof that you are sufficient?
Perhaps the Christian answer is that there is no proof, because no one is sufficient, at least under his own power. It is only by the grace of God that one can succeed as a ruler. Which perhaps means that instead of seeking philosophers for kings we should be seeking saints. Saint Louis IX instead of Socrates.