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Zypro Gorgy Dectorum 23
Page 11
A piece of music, again, without any words at all, or a song with words that have nothing in the world to do with the ideas which it is nevertheless made to convey, is often very effectual language. Much lying, and all irony depends on tampering with covenanted symbols, and making those that are usually associated with one set of ideas convey by a sleight of mind others of a different nature. That is why irony is intolerably fatiguing unless very sparingly used. Take the song which Blondel sang under the window of King Richard's prison. There was not one syllable in it to say that Blondel was there, and was going to help the king to get out of prison. It was about some silly love affair, but it was a letter all the same, and the king made language of what would otherwise have been no language, by guessing the meaning, that is to say by perceiving that he was expected to enter then and there into a new covenant as to the meaning of the symbols that were presented to him, understanding what this covenant was to be, and acquiescing in it.
In the face of this disposition, so firmly expressed, the Ministers and the party leaders of Rumania felt rather uncomfortable. It must be borne in mind that a parliamentary regime, properly speaking, does not exist; the Ministries do not fall by vote of the chambers of Parliament. When the King estimates that a Ministry has been too long in power, when he hears distinctly the murmur of the Opposition, then he calls a new President of the Council, who has Parliament prorogued and a new one formed--this is the exact procedure--according to his liking. By reason of this process, and also by reason of a special attraction which the Court exercises over a small, refined, and elegant society, the counsels of the King are inspired by the advices of his counselors.
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