WHAT IS MAN? AND OTHER ESSAYS OF MARK TWAIN

in another half-minute they would have been in the house, but

then a thing happened which delayed them–the only solitary thing

in this world which could be relied on with certainty to

accomplish it, I suppose–an imperial princess appeared in the

balcony above them. They stopped dead in their tracks and began

to gaze in a stupor of gratitude and satisfaction. The lady

presently saw that she must disappear or the doors would be

closed upon these worshipers, so she returned to her box. This

daughter-in-law of an emperor was pretty; she had a kind face;

she was without airs; she is known to be full of common human

sympathies. There are many kinds of princesses, but this kind is

the most harmful of all, for wherever they go they reconcile

people to monarchy and set back the clock of progress. The

valuable princes, the desirable princes, are the czars and their

sort. By their mere dumb presence in the world they cover with

derision every argument that can be invented in favor of royalty

by the most ingenious casuist. In his time the husband of this

princess was valuable. He led a degraded life, he ended it with

his own hand in circumstances and surroundings of a hideous sort,

and was buried like a god.

In the opera-house there is a long loft back of the

audience, a kind of open gallery, in which princes are displayed.

It is sacred to them; it is the holy of holies. As soon as the

filling of the house is about complete the standing multitude

turn and fix their eyes upon the princely layout and gaze mutely

and longingly and adoringly and regretfully like sinners looking

into heaven. They become rapt, unconscious, steeped in worship.

There is no spectacle anywhere that is more pathetic than this.

It is worth crossing many oceans to see. It is somehow not the

same gaze that people rivet upon a Victor Hugo, or Niagara, or

the bones of the mastodon, or the guillotine of the Revolution,

or the great pyramid, or distant Vesuvius smoking in the sky, or

any man long celebrated to you by his genius and achievements, or

thing long celebrated to you by the praises of books and

pictures–no, that gaze is only the gaze of intense curiosity,

interest, wonder, engaged in drinking delicious deep draughts

that taste good all the way down and appease and satisfy the

thirst of a lifetime. Satisfy it–that is the word. Hugo and

the mastodon will still have a degree of intense interest

thereafter when encountered, but never anything approaching the

ecstasy of that first view. The interest of a prince is

different. It may be envy, it may be worship, doubtless it is a

mixture of both–and it does not satisfy its thirst with one

view, or even noticeably diminish it. Perhaps the essence of the

thing is the value which men attach to a valuable something which

has come by luck and not been earned. A dollar picked up in the

road is more satisfaction to you than the ninety-and-nine which

you had to work for, and money won at faro or in stocks snuggles

into your heart in the same way. A prince picks up grandeur,

power, and a permanent holiday and gratis support by a pure

accident, the accident of birth, and he stands always before the

grieved eye of poverty and obscurity a monumental representative

of luck. And then–supremest value of all-his is the only high

fortune on the earth which is secure. The commercial millionaire

may become a beggar; the illustrious statesman can make a vital

mistake and be dropped and forgotten; the illustrious general can

lose a decisive battle and with it the consideration of men; but

once a prince always a prince–that is to say, an imitation god,

and neither hard fortune nor an infamous character nor an addled

brain nor the speech of an ass can undeify him. By common

consent of all the nations and all the ages the most valuable

thing in this world is the homage of men, whether deserved or

undeserved. It follows without doubt or question, then, that the

most desirable position possible is that of a prince. And I

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