One story that profoundly sticks to my mind and that I recall with reverence as I navigate this world is that of the trial and execution of Charles Stuart I, King of England, Scotland, and Ireland, who was beheaded by the rump of his own parliament after being tried and convicted for treason in his own country. Aged 48 at the time, Charles’ life was a dramatic roller coaster from the moment he was a small child and the constant in it was that he always held himself to a high standard. His dignity was never something to be negotiated.
Early Life
Born on November 19th, 1600, Charles was the youngest child of the King of Scotland, James Stuart VI and his wife, Anne of Denmark. In March 1603, when Charles was but two, Elizabeth Tudor, Queen of England and Ireland for over forty years, died, and her first cousin twice removed, James, succeeded to the thrones of her kingdoms, as he was her senior genealogical relative. As James and his family made the trip south from Edinburgh to London, one member was conspicuously absent: James’ youngest son, Charles. The boy was in such fragile health that his father was worried the traveling would adversely affect him, and in truth, nobody expected Charles to survive to adulthood.
Charles did eventually make the trip, and was determined to overcome both his physical weaknesses and the stammer in his speech. In the first area, he took up a vigorous program of exercise to strengthen his body, taking long runs around the park and eventually taking up horse riding, fencing, and shooting. He would become proficient in all three. Attempting to overcome his stammer, Charles would place pebbles in his mouth and try to speak. The latter therapy, as you might expect, was not as successful.
The young prince strove to hold himself to a higher standard than his father James, whose court has had a reputation of casualness and carousing ever since his reign. Charles was appalled by his father’s seemingly un-kingly behavior, and now heir to the throne (his stronger elder brother Henry died in 1612), he was determined to go a different, more elegant direction with his own court when the time came. Father and son did agree on one very important aspect of kingship however- the monarch’s divine right to rule his realm, accountable only to God. This belief, and Charles’ adamant defense of it, would haunt him throughout his entire reign, and ultimately cause his undoing.
Accession to the Throne & Troubles with Parliament
James died in 1625, and Charles became King of the three kingdoms. It must have been a very pleasing moment for the young king. Doubted by his own family that he would even survive to adulthood, Charles was now on the throne, helped in no small part by his determination to overcome his weaknesses.
Almost immediately however, as his father before him, Charles was at odds with his Parliaments. Its power over the purse being established during the Middle Ages, Charles, as all Kings of England, needed the consent of Parliament to obtain the money he needed to pay for his projects. However, he found his various Parliaments so disagreeable that he dissolved them very quickly, and was determined to rule alone. This he did successfully for eleven years, finding creative ways to raise money (some of these ways however, such as the infamous Ship Money, were bitterly resented, and cost Charles much goodwill).
Civil War
Eventually, troubles in Scotland caused by Charles’ religious policies forced him to call a Parliament, as it was the only body that could vote him the money he needed to deal with the situation. This ‘Short Parliament’ was dissolved quickly, but the situation in Scotland was now so dire that Charles had no choice but to call another one, the ‘Long Parliament,’ and negotiate. Part of these negotiations led to the execution of Charles’ close friend and advisor, Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford. In an act of complete misery and humiliation, Charles needed to sign his own friend’s death warrant, and he agonized for the longest time before finally caving. This was an act which Charles would never forgive himself for.
During these rounds of negotiations, Parliament, sensing weakness, pounced and demanded, among other things, Parliamentary control of the military. This infuriated Charles. In January of 1642, Charles acted how any man might when pushed to the brink. Seeing what could only be described to him as a body of petulant, unsatisfied children attempting to usurp the ancient laws of the land, the King reacted with swift force. He went to arrest five troublesome MPs in the House of Commons and one in the Lords on a charge of treason, but they were all warned beforehand and escaped. War was now inevitable.
How many of us might react in the same way? It is difficult to keep one’s composure in the face of such insolence. This website has been the focus of much the same kind of attacks—the strong mob probing for or sensing weakness in the party from which it wants something. Charles resolved to bravely stand up for what he perceived as his divinely granted rights, and to punish the wickedness of the mob.
The war however, was not kind to Charles or the Royalist cause. He faced a superiority in manpower from the beginning, the military brilliance of Sir Thomas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell, and the might of the New Model Army—the nascent genesis of the professional British soldier that would conquer a quarter of the globe in centuries to come. These factors were too much and finally brought the King to defeat. In 1648, after failing in his attempt to restore himself to power in the Second Civil War, the King was brought to trial.
Trial & Execution
The decision to try Charles was a controversial one. Most of the Long Parliament simply thought that they were fighting to bring the King to the negotiating table. These moderates were purged by the army, leaving only a rump that consented to the trial.
Charles’ dignity was on display at its absolute best in the last chapter of his life. He refused to cooperate with the court or answer the charges, rightly claiming that there was no law in England that allowed for the trial of the King. He would answer, he said, when he knew by what authority he was brought before this tribunal.
Charles calmly faced down his accusers in this event. He lost his stammer, speaking clearly and powerfully. He explained that the Divine Right of Kings and the ancient laws of the land did not allow for this farce of a court.
Nevertheless, the verdict was never in doubt, and Charles knew this. His power had been gutted by the war. On January 27th, 1649, Charles was declared guilty of high treason and sentenced to execution three days later.
The 30th was a bitterly cold day. Charles demanded extra shirts so that he would not shiver as he made his way to Whitehall in the frigid winter air. He did not want anyone to mistake a shiver from the cold for shivering due to fear. After bidding a tearful farewell to two of his children, he walked the last walk of his life. He was not afraid nor did he even think that his execution was wrong—he felt that it was the just price to be paid for his earlier execution of the Earl of Strafford, and respectfully owned up to this mistake before God.
Addressing the people gathered to witness the event, Charles showed neither fear nor sorrow, and, after assuring that his intention was to uphold the laws and liberties of his realm declared:
I go now from a corruptible to an incorruptible crown, where no disturbance can be.
The King was then beheaded, shocking the crowd and all of Europe.
Though Charles had been defeated in the war and placed in a position of powerlessness, he never let his enemies rob him of his dignity. His adamant refusal to negotiate cost him the war, his crown, and his life, but his self-worth was not to be lost. In the face of a most stressful situation, he refused to let his enemies set the frame against him, retaining control of the one thing he still had power over- his self-respect.
Posterity will remember a man for his accomplishments and his failures, but it will also remember him for his dignity and character. Thus, though the loser, Charles is often remembered in a positive light, considered a martyr, and his memory carries with it the air of nobility that his character created.
Always strive to hold your self-respect in the highest regard. It is how people will remember you when you are gone and how people will value you in your time in this world. And it is the one thing that is not subject to the chaotic whims of fortune.
The 34th law: act like a king to be treated like one.
So Charles did. Even to his death.
Read More: The Manliest of Men: Adrian Carton de Wiart
Charles I like Richard II and Louis XVI didn’t understand where his power came from.
He thought that it came from God whereas it actually came from the landowning ruling classes. His power was dependent on their support for him.
In all three cases these leaders were brought down because they failed to live in the real world, they failed to compromise with anyone and they did not realise that respect is a two way street.
Charles I was such a dickhead that he even waged war upon his own subjects when he conspired with Scottish leaders to restart the Civil War which sealed his fate.
Quite correct. He was too arrogant. As Robert Greene says in the 48 Laws, he should have made a show of surrendering some of his power when things became too heated. Your second paragraph is something Elizabeth I clearly understood and Charles did not.
Still, I admire his conduct during the trial at the very least. Your self-respect should not be for sale to anyone. Perhaps Charles’ greatest fault was that he took everything too personally.
He was verily in need of an intervention.
If only such a thing had existed in the 17th century.
As far as I’m concerned, the only time Charles I acted laudably as an adult was during the trial, because the bitch was without options. That’s how you handle bitches. Don’t be fooled by masculine sexuality. lol I am learning how to handle men with mastery of indifference, etc. CH has recently posted on how to handle a crazy bitch. Sometimes the same shit applies to kings.
Hitler and Stalin sure had a lot of self-respect as well.
Wonderful people too, I hear they also loved things like mass murder and genocide.
You can be the biggest douche in the world and adding “self-respect” would only make you a bigger douche. It’s not a silver bullet.
Charles 1 was an evil despot who was executed for essentially declaring war on his own people, there is an entire book on TNT trial and execution of him called the ‘tyranicide brief’ by Geoffrey Robertson QC.
Charles’ son had the people who conducted the trail either deported to territory where a writ of hebius corpus wouldn’t extend (setting an early precedent for Gunatanamo bay) or hung drawn and quartered, which is what happened to the prosecuting counsel John Cooke who was tried and found guilty of treason after a rigged trial at the old bailey.
I couldn’t agree more. It reminds me of this scene from Monty Python.
King Arthur:
I am your king.
Woman:
Well I didn’t vote for you.
King Arthur:
You don’t vote for kings.
Woman:
Well how’d you become king then?
[Angelic music plays… ]
King Arthur:
The Lady of the Lake, her arm clad in the purest shimmering samite held
aloft Excalibur from the bosom of the water, signifying by divine
providence that I, Arthur, was to carry Excalibur. THAT is why I am your
king.
Dennis:
[interrupting]
Listen, strange women lyin’ in ponds distributin’ swords is no basis for
a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate
from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
In no way whatsoever was Charles I a despot. Much less an evil one. He thought he had the right to rule without Parliament. Parliament disagreed. The list of people he had tortured and murdered is remarkably short.
Charles II did not need to deport anyone anywhere. Of the 59 people involved in the execution of his father, he had a dozen or so executed – after a trial in Britain. For what was, after all, an act of treason. He did get at least one of them sent back from Germany. But those that made it to the Netherlands lived out their days. As did those that fled to British America. No one was executed overseas.
John Cooke does not appear on this list of regicides:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regicides_of_Charles_I
Have you made him up?
The fact is that Royals are invariably less bloodthirsty that revolutionaries. You can look to France – or even to America. America’s Tories did nothing but remain loyal to their rightful, legal government. For that they were either lynched or driven out of the country and their property stolen. Charles II did not execute a *majority* of the people who killed his Father. He carried out no mass purge. He agreed to ask no questions about what people were doing. Landowners who were loyal to him didn’t even get their property back.
I’m sorry but believing that you quite literally have a God given right to rule people is sort of a little bit despotish.
But he only tortured a remarkably short list of people in pursuit of this delusion so that’s OK then.
Far, far fewer than Cromwell and the Roundheads tortured and killed…and Cromwell was very much in pursuit of all manner of delusion, enforcing the banning of sports, theater, women’s makeup and Christmas. Cromwell’s treatment of the people of Ireland was particularly horrifying.
Between the two there’s absolutely no comparison, Charles I was infinitely the more humane and more virtuous ruler. That isn’t ideological, that’s just fact.
It depends on what you do with it. All Charles II did, for instance, was breed dogs and sleep with pretty women.
The fact is Revolutionaries always, everywhere, kill and torture vastly more people than the regimes they overthrow. That applies to the Regicides just as it does to the French or Russian Revolutions, the Chinese Communists, the Khmer Rouge – or the American Revolutionaries. Revolution solves nothing, at least nothing it claims it wants to solve. It only makes a bad situation worse.
It is not despotish or delusional to believe you have a divine right to rule if your countrymen agree, and your country/continent has a long tradition of kings ruling by various divine rights.
Read the book, just because you can’t find him on a Google search doesn’t mean he was made up, he’s registered as practicing at the Bar at Gray’s Inn in London, one of the four Inns of Court a Barrister must be connected to in order to practice in the UK
“Charles 1 was an evil despot who was executed for essentially declaring war on his own people”
The winners write the history books.
And Geoffrey Robinson? He is a criminal and he knows it.
As I recall from history, Charles I followed his father James I and IV in the dogma Divine Right of Kings. You say: “His dignity was never something to be negotiated,” and “retaining control of the one thing he still had power over- his self-respect.”
Empiricism is the only calibrated window on truth. An alpha must cooperate with others because might makes right and state-of-the-art competitiveness in evolutionary terms requires cooperative excellence. Charles I was a head case. He wanted power over everyone else’s dignity as if it were his own. That is a corrupt idea very far from the truth, and the judgment of nature was clear on this.
Analects 13:3
Zi Lu said: “The ruler of Wei is anticipating your assistance in the
administration of his state. What will be your top priority?”
Confucius said, “There must be a correction of terminology.”
Zi Lu said, “Are you serious? Why is this so important?”
Confucius said, “You are really simple, aren’t you? A noble man is cautious about
jumping to conclusions about that which he does not know.”
“If terminology is not corrected, then what is said cannot be followed. If what is said cannot be followed, then work cannot be accomplished. If work cannot be accomplished, then ritual and music cannot be developed. If ritual and music cannot be developed, then criminal punishments will not be appropriate. If criminal punishments are not appropriate, the people cannot make a move. Therefore, the noble man needs to have his terminology applicable to real language, and his speech must accord with his actions. The speech of the noble man cannot be indefinite.”
Source: http://www.acmuller.net/con-dao/analects.html#div-14
Give me control of language and I care not who makes the laws!
That the just powers of government are derived from the consent of the people is, to use a technical term from political science, fucking bullshit. It’s a liberal ploy to replace the good with arbitrary will. It’s part and parcel of the modern rebellion against God.
Cromwell and the other Roundheads were traitorous scum. Hanging, drawing and quartering were too good for those motherfuckers.
I’m going to assume that you are being serious.
Human beings are mammals and operate in packs. Each pack has an Alpha and this position is usually held by a male.
God (who I believe in) doesn’t come into it. God created the physical laws like gravity but he isn’t gravity and he doesn’t need to do anything to make sure than gravity keeps on working.
You think God gave a shit about the English Civil War? He didn’t even know who the Earl of Manchester was never mind which machinations he got up to the shifty turncoat bastard.
1 Sam 8– They cried out for a king to rule over them, so that they could be like the other nations. God warned them that their King would be hard to live under, would take their sons for foreign wars and demand taxes from their profits. They didn’t care, they wanted a King, and God gave them one.
Cromwell means to me a return to a theonomy. Kingship means to me a return to crying like babies to be ruled over.
verse 18– “And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the Lord will not hear you in that day.”
I am a sovereign, Jesus is my High Priest. The gates of hell shall not prevail.
Nothing modern about that rebellion, but otherwise spot on!
I’m with Cromwell.
Cromwell was a bastard, if there is an afterlife, he is in Hell as well as all his followers.
If there is an afterlife *and* the Puritans had it wrong.
Very well done, Libertas. A great historical anecdote that sheds light on a lesson well worth remembering.
So Charles acted exactly as a modern day feminist .. and you think that’s “just great” ?!
Feminists too claim to be superior to men and have a God given right to female privilege. They can rule the inferior men because God gave them the right and there would be NO NEGOTIATIONS and NO DIALOGUE.
The People said, look dude you are a human just like all of us. We have just as mutch right to rule our own lives and destiny. And he was like Noooooo mysoginy, blesphamy …you will do what i say or i will kill you all. No discussions allowed.
Yeah that behaviour deserves respect … Not!
You’re completely missing the point of the post. Never was it said that all of Charles’ actions were admirable.
The quality of articles here has dropped latelly. Most are link baiting pseudo scandalous essays.
Apart from the one that introduced me to the book “the predatory female” and it’s excellent comments that suggested other great books.
Next Article Should be “Never Put Your Racism On The Pool Table”
Dignity or not, Wether you are afraid or brave at the time of your execution/death….the lesson learned from his story is simple…..don’t lose.
Well, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but nobody to date has figured out a way to not lose, so I wouldn’t put too many of my eggs in that basket if I were you.
I’m afraid my statement was taken out of context. Some kings have died on the throne from natural causes etc. I would call that not losing. Also, it was important to know your enemies (their strengths and weaknesses before you take action. There is always a way to win….even if it means waiting for a better opportunity.
” . . . my statement was taken out of context.”
Certainly, You left the door ajar so I walked in. It happens.
” . . .natural causes etc. I would call that not losing.”
Perhaps you should reconsider that position. Hardly anybody lives as long as their potential and the game has many deep and subtle layers.
Lol, perhaps I should. It also depends on your definition of losing. You are correct about game. Point taken!
There’s never a foolproof way to win (the whims of fortune are too chaotic for that), but there are steps you can take to at the very least mitigate your chances of losing.
Taking things too personally is the first thing not to do.
lol, true!
One other comment.
This article reminds me of Montaigne’s essay “No Man Should Be Called Happy Until After His Death”. The gist of his essay was that (1) we can’t really judge a man’s life until his last day of life; and (2) a man’s conduct in the face of death defines him. “In this last scene between ourselves and death, there is no more pretense.”
Or as Ovid says, “One should always wait until a man’s last day, and never call him happy before his death and funeral.” (Metamorph. III.135)
That’s the gist.
Charles certainly made very bad mistakes as King- he should have negotiated with Parliament far earlier and not alienated it the way he did before the personal rule. But despite the fact that he was defeated and demoralized, he would not allow himself to be humiliated as the clock ticked down on his last days on Earth.
How many of us lose our cool at a moment’s notice? I used to be that way until only a short time ago. How many men sell themselves to women and allow such humiliation of their own selves?
Here was a man who was condemned to die and yet maintained his composure. It is when your back is against the wall that your true character emerges.
Quintus,
I do not need to wait until the last day of the lives of most men in the west to judge them and judge them most harshly.
I have a client, Darrell Foote, who is currently being subjected to war crimes in James Nash House in Adelaide South Australia….full details on the link.
And yet? There can not be a “man” found to go down to James Nash House and determine the state of his well being.
We have even claimed into existece a state of limited conflict so that deadly force can be used against those who are complicit in these war crimes.
So yes…I judge western men very harshly now. They deserve it when they will not help a man who is unlawfully incarcerated.
http://www.crimesagainstfathers.com/australia/Cases/tabid/421/forumid/469/threadid/7684/scope/posts/Default.aspx
not very convincing. charles should have read The Prince and maybe he would have kept his head.
In Japanese and Chinese culture there are a lot of martyrs. Servants who are loyal to their masters until their death (47 Ronins for example). Generals who refuse to surrender to rebels and are then brutally executed. In ancient Asia, honor comes first. When a man loses his honor and dignity, he doesn’t deserve to live anymore.
“Noble Sirs, I am unable to speak to you one by one and lay a charge
upon each individual. But I say to you: Maintain your self-respect.”
Here here, sir!
For attempting to aid the filthy Catholic Spanish against the freedom-loving Dutch, Charles I should have been tortured before execution.
“but it will also remember him for his dignity and character.”
One of the more interesting things I experience is the continued bad mouthing, lies and slander about me. Even in this place many men here claim that I have not done what I have proven I have done or claimed I have done.
So many men in the west are so ready to lie about another man it is not funny any more. Oh for the days where questioning a mans honour could be satisfied in a duel. Now men like to tell lies about other men from behind the relative safety of an anonymous userid on the web.
If you want to see what so many men are like now? Just look at Chris Merrett. He has been slandering me for three years now.
http://www.crimesagainstfathers.com/australia/Cases/tabid/421/forumid/466/threadid/5966/scope/posts/Default.aspx
And if anyone wants to know just how pampered women are? This is a big story today on the daily mail……..a woman is “victimised” because she ate some chicken…
Meanwhile….men whose lives are being destroyed is not a story.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2531093/I-feel-like-not-body-anymore-Vegetarians-outrage-going-Nandos-served-chicken-mistake.html
I am reading adventure novels written before the 1930’s and I notice one thing: the protagonist has a sense of nobility, strength of character, virtuosity, but most important they have exceptional emotional control. For an example of a “nice guy omega” transforming into an “alpha” read Smoke Bellew by Jack London. The transformation happened in the cold northern tundra of Canada, fraught with peril and goals.
This is a good article because it shows how the ego can trick one, but it doesn’t describe HOW to achieve emotional control. I feel it is achieved in four ways: 1) achieving something great 2) surviving a near death experience 3) forcing yourself to be unreactive 4) Having a code by which you live. But maybe i’m wrong?
I have been trying to achieve control over my emotions (not really control — more like not resisting them, merely observing them) and what I have noticed by observation of my emotions was that I am always full of ‘wants’. I ‘want’ this, I ‘want’ that, and yet I pay no heed to the present moment. But I always find myself slipping into the way I previously was — like a fog of thought that covers the mind — a fog that I have begun to notice more often and have thus been trying to bring myself into the present….but its damn hard
I am curious though, the authors of old that wrote strong characters, deeply rooted in their masculinity, unperturbable like an oak tree in a storm, that had control over themselves and their actions, that live with no regard for the future, being fully content with the present moment — do these men truly win the hearts of women like the authors wrote? Or is it merely an ideal?
This is something I have never experienced, but that is an ideal in my mind. Maybe someone can shed some light on this?
I am reading adventure novels written before the 1930’s and I notice one thing: the protagonist has a sense of nobility, strength of character, virtuosity, but most important they have exceptional emotional control. For an example of a “nice guy omega” transforming into an “alpha” read Smoke Bellew by Jack London. The transformation happened in the cold northern tundra of Canada, fraught with peril and goals.
HOW does one achieve emotional control and build a strong character. I feel it is achieved in four ways: 1) achieving something great 2) surviving a near death experience 3) forcing yourself to be unreactive 4) Having a code by which you live. But maybe i’m wrong?
When people talk of ‘false friends’ giving ‘false promises’ from experience I have noticed that it occurs to people of weak character (it has happened to me) but towards men of strong character these rules do not apply?
I have been trying to achieve control over my emotions (not really control — more like not resisting them, merely observing them) and what I have noticed by observation of my emotions was that I am always full of ‘wants’. I ‘want’ this, I ‘want’ that, and yet I pay no heed to the present moment. But I always find myself slipping into the way I previously was — like a fog of thought that covers the mind — a fog that I have begun to notice more often and have thus been trying to bring myself into the present….but its damn hard
I am curious though, the authors of old that wrote strong characters, deeply rooted in their masculinity, unperturbable like an oak tree in a storm, that had control over themselves and their actions, that live with no regard for the future, being fully content with the present moment — do these men truly win the hearts of women like the authors wrote? Or is it merely an ideal?
This is something I have never experienced, but that is an ideal in my mind. Maybe someone can shed some light on this?
I accidentally posted a response I had to another article. Please delete that one, and keep this one.
Thanks for the book rec. I recently read The White Company by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and highly reccomend it as a pre 1930s adventure novel. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_White_Company
I’ve never seen a redpiller with dignity anyway, so this is a complete non-issue.