Charles Dickens

“ I fancy I see them all on the seashore together; the king's chair sinking in the sand; the king in a mighty good-humor with his own wisdom; and the courtiers pretending to be quite stunned by it!
It is not the sea alone that is bidden to go "thus far, and no farther." The great command goes forth to all the kings upon the earth, and went to Canute in the year one thousand and thirty-five, and stretched him dead upon his bed. ”

“ We may learn from this, I think, that a little sense will go a long way in a king; and that courtiers are not easily cured of flattery, nor kings of a liking for it. If the courtiers of Canute had not known, long before, that the king was fond of flattery, they would have known better than to offer it in such large doses. ”