The Consolidator; or, Memoirs of Sundry Transactions from the World in the MoonDefoe, Daniel
Science
The Consolidator; or, Memoirs of Sundry Transactions from the World in the Moon
Defoe, Daniel
Fantasy fiction; Interplanetary voyages -- Fiction; Moon -- Fiction; Political fiction; Satire
'Let him that can answer these Paradoxes defend his Title if he can;
and what shall we now say to the War in Ebronia, only this, that they
are going to fight for the Crown of Ebronia? and to take it away from
one that has no Right to it, to give it to one that has a less Right
than he, and 'tis to be fear'd that if Heaven be Righteous, 'twill
succeed accordingly.
'The Gentlemen of Letters who have wrote of this in our Lunar World,
on the Subject of the Gallunarians Title, have took a great deal of
Liberty in the Eagle's behalf, to Banter and Ridicule the Gallunarian
sham of a Title, as if it were a pretence too weak for any Prince to
make use of, to talk of Kings giving their Crowns by Will.
Kingdoms and Governments, says a Learned Lunar author, are not things
of such indifferent Value to be given away, like a Token left for a
Legacy. If any Prince has ever given or transferr'd his Government,
it has been done by solemn Act, and the People have been call'd to
assent and confirm such Concessions.
'Then the same Author goes on, to Treat the King of Gallunaria with a
great deal of Severity, and exposes his Politicks, that he should
think to put upon the Moon with so empty, so weak, so ridiculous a
Pretence, as the Will of a weak Headed Prince, who neither had a
Right to give his Crown, nor a Brain to know what he was doing, and
he laughs to think what the King of Gallunaria would have said to
have such a dull Trick as that, put upon him in any such Case.
'Now when we have been so Witty upon this very Article, of giving
away the Crown to the King of Gallunaria's Grandson, as an
incongruous and ridiculous Thing, shall we come to make the same
Incongruity be the Foundation of a War?
'With what Justice can we make a War for a Prince who has only a good
Title, by Vertue of the self same Action which makes the Grandson of
his Enemy have a bad Title.
'I always thought we had a Just Ground to make War on Ebronia, as we
were bound by former Alliances to assist the Eagle in the recovery of
it in case of the death of the late King of that Country.
'But now the Eagle has refus'd the Succession, and his Eldest Son has
refus'd it, I would be glad to see it prov'd how the second Son can
have a Title, and yet the other King have no Title.
'What a strange sort of a Thing is the Crown of Ebronia, that two of
the greatest Princes of the Lunar World should Fight, not who shall
have it, for neither of them will accept of it, but who shall have
the Power of giving it away.
'Here are four Princes refuse it; the King of Gallunaria's Sons had a
Title in Right of their Mother, and 'twas not the former
Renunciations that would have barr'd them, if this softer way had not
been found out; for time was it has been pleaded on behalf of the
eldest Son of the Gallunarian King, that his Mother could not give
away his Right before he was born.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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