Gibbon: The true interest of an absolute monarch generally coincides with that of his people

The true interest of an absolute monarch generally coincides with that of his people. Their numbers, their wealth, their order, and their security, are the best and only foundations of his real greatness; and were he totally devoid of virtue, prudence might supply its place, and would dictate the same rule of conduct.

  --Edward Gibbon (1737-1794) in The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (published 1776-1788), Vol. 1, ch. V.