The Once and Future King

Part 2 focuses on the young King Arthur and his wars against the Gaels, but his education is more moral and philosophical than military. Standing above the fray of battle with Excalibur in hand, Arthur sees only the glory and “fun” of battle. It’s a game, and the toll of war is lost on him until Merlyn forces him to consider it. When Arthur realizes that might doesn’t make right, it’s an epiphany that marks the young king’s maturation from boy to man, as well as a true leader. Merlyn responds by uttering the canticle in which Simeon asks for leave to depart, suggesting that Arthur’s education is complete and that he is now on his own.

Arthur’s core realization is that the conflict between Might Versus Right does not need to be a conflict at all. Based on both his experiences among the animals and Merlin’s discourses on human history, Arthur believes humans have an innate tendency toward violence. However, he suggests that this tendency can be redirected for good purposes: “The knights in my order will ride all over the world, still dressed in steel and whacking away with their swords—that will give an outlet for wanting to whack […]—but they will be bound to strike only on behalf of what is good” (248). The same philosophy will apply to Arthur’s reign writ large: As Merlyn hinted, Arthur will make war only to subdue England’s warring factions and bring about a lasting peace under a single ruler.

This is an idealistic view of power, and there are already hints that things may not work out as Arthur hopes. Significantly, White introduces the characters of Morgause (sister of Morgan le Fay) and her four sons just as a new era seems poised to emerge under Arthur’s rule. The family sees Arthur as their sworn enemy, and while the fact that Morgause’s sons go on to “[become] famous knights at the court of the great king” testifies to Arthur’s skills as conciliator and diplomat (214), underlying fractures remain. Although the Gaels’ grievances are couched in the language of familial loyalty and ethnic identity, Merlyn implies that something more fundamental is at play. He is dismissive of Arthur’s suggestion that Morgause and her people have good cause to resist Arthur’s rule, noting that every group was at one point an aggressor or invader and thus suggesting that the Normans are no more oppressive than anyone else: “You simply go on and on, until you get to Cain and Abel. […] Your father settled the unfortunate Saxons long ago, however brutally he did it, and when a great many years have passed one ought to be ready to accept a status quo” (231). His point is not that violence is justified but rather that it is an inherent part of human behavior. Arthur’s proposed code of chivalry acknowledges this, but it does not grapple with another point that Merlyn hints at: that violence is difficult to control. Merlyn objects to the Gaelic rebellion in part because it aims to divide the country into smaller sections, which he believes only encourages further strife: “If you keep on dividing you end up as a collection of monkeys throwing nuts at each other out of separate trees” (231). Arthur’s plan is to harness violence for the purpose of maintaining (peaceful) unity, but the novel suggests that there is an inherent relationship between violence and disunity.