Algernon Sidney asks a question that makes everything easier to understand. “Did the people make the king, or the king make the people? Is the king for the people, or the people for the king?”

It’s not hard to see that a king, does not make the people. However, we can decide if the king will be for us, or the other way around. If we obey every command of the “king” whether he be virtuous, or whether he push virtue away, whether he does good, or evil, still we follow him blindly, then we have made ourselves for him. We have made ourselves his slaves. A slave is meant for his ruler, to do everything he says despite the ruler’s qualities… is that what we want to be? Because that is not what it’s meant to be. 

If we obey the king, only when he rules with virtue, and inside the boundaries we’ve set for him, then he will be for us. He will protect us and serve us. A tyrant wants you to believe that you are to obey his every word, no matter what, but that is not the case. Our duty, is to make sure we do not make ourselves subjects to the king, otherwise we have made ourselves slaves.  A king is meant to make us freer, not the other way around. A king is meant to keep us safe, not put us in danger. A king is meant for us, we are not meant for the king, and let’s strive to return it that way. 

With highest hopes,

Publius