THE crowning of a king or queen carries the mind back to the Coronations of all those other monarchs who have been crowned before.
The ideal of hereditary monarchy can be viewed as a unifying one, binding together the current nation with those who lived before and those still to be born. From another perspective monarchy is a fairly primitive method of governance, now largely redundant.
As the eye surveys that glittering albeit blood stained chain of which every king is a link, one sees the very beginning of the race and of the State that has raised and preserved it. The King is mortal and dies -
This is a sleep
That from this golden rigol hath divorced
So many English Kings
But the institution of monarchy does not die with the death of the monarch, and instead continues its binding function from age to age. Yet at a certain point in a civilisation's evolution its monarchy will surely die too as is necessary for a true democracy.
Each Coronation is a presented as a sacrament at which the nation celebrates its beginnings, reaffirms its purpose, and dedicates itself anew. 'There is not one since the earliest days which is not full of significance to him that can read aright.'
Coronations are naturally associated with national rejoicing and gladness, though not all of them have been celebrated with gladness.