Can we survive another Diana?

We were visiting my wife’s mother, and it was she who broke the news, by responding to my cheerful “Good morning!” with: “The Princess of Wales is dead!”

“And I didn’t even know she was ill,” I said rather insensitively. “It was a car accident, in Paris,” said my mother-in-law, obviously shocked. “And Dodi?” “He’s dead too!”

That created an inner conflict for me. My Christian side insisted that I at least feign grief. My secular side, on the other hand, heaved a sigh of relief. Diana died, I thought, so that our monarchy may live a little longer.

De mortius nil nisi bonum and all that, but, once Diana realised that ‘being me’ wasn’t always compatible with her constitutional role as our future queen, she seemed to have devoted every effort to hurting the monarchy.

Whether she did that out of spite or out of sheer silliness is an ultimately moot question. It’s only really interesting to the coterie of Professional Friends of Diana, vociferously led by Rosa Monckton (Mrs Dominic Lawson).

Anyway, the week following the death of the PC Princess-Goddess united all decent people. We were brought together by an acute sense of tragedy over the untimely demise of British sanity.

Even as Diana’s ‘beautiful body’ (in Julie Burchill’s expert evaluation) still lay oozing ichor onto the grimy cement of a Paris tunnel, the nation fell prey to mass necrophilia expertly whipped up by the press.

By the end of the week, hysterical hagiography for halfwits scaled dizzying depths, and there was no getting away. Pursued by nightmares of anorexic, HIV-positive lepers splattered all over the rain forest by land mines, I remember lying awake at night, fantasising about driving my fist through Tony Blair’s diabolical grin as he uttered the words ‘people’s princess’.

It took several years for the royal family to repair the dents to their dignity kicked in by that manipulative, self-serving woman who had no sense of her role in Britain’s history and constitution.

And now the Diana hysteria, bottled for a few years, is about to pop the cork and splash out again. This time the object of public frenzy will be Prince Harry’s fiancée Meghan Markle, who has already laid down a marker for becoming a Diana Mark II.

One would think that the royal family would have learned the lesson the first time around, when Edward VIII married an American actress with a rather colourful past. The monarchy suffered a heavy blow then, and only HMG’s resolute interference managed to avoid a catastrophe, if not embarrassment.

In general, the old tradition of princes marrying other royals, or at least the offspring of high aristocracy, makes sense. Unless trained to do so from the cradle, it’s hard for a young woman to squeeze her hormone-rich personality into the straitjacket of disciplined service demanded of the royals.

‘Service’ is the operative word, for, now they’ve been divested of executive power, the royals’ sole duty is to serve the realm in every way they can. Various charitable and ceremonial projects are vitally important, but by far the most critical service they can provide is maintaining the dignity and honour of the throne.

For the throne is one of the few things that still make Britain British; it’s the adhesive moulding the generations past, present and future into a recognisable continuum. Without the monarchy, Britain may thrive or it may collapse. But one thing for sure: it won’t be Britain any longer.

Any newcomer to the dynasty ought to remember that, though this noble service is well rewarded, it also imposes certain demands. These are especially harsh on today’s people, trained to believe that their own selves are uniquely important and can’t be sacrificed for something nebulous they can’t quite get their heads around.

Diana and her sister-and-law Fergie are prime illustrations of this, and both damaged the dynasty by refusing to subjugate their private urges to the public good. And now Prince Harry, fifth (soon to be sixth) in the line of succession, is bringing another divorced American into the family.

We all know the path B-actresses tread to stardom, and one can only hope Meghan was different, or at least more discreet than most. Chances are, however, that before long we’ll be treated to the kind of stories and photographs that Her Majesty might find distasteful in her granddaughter-in-law.

That, however, would be a minor irritant, not much more damaging than those long shots of a topless Kate appearing in a French magazine a few years ago. The real harm may come not from what Meghan has done in the past but from what I fear she may do in the future.

The past and present aren’t infallible predictors of the future, but they don’t often go wrong, especially when supported by stated intentions. That’s why I fear that Meghan will play her new role according to the script she has followed for years.

Specifically, she has never seen a ‘liberal’ cause she couldn’t love and support, displaying well-publicised energy in doing so. Hence I shudder reading Andrew Morton’s biography of Meghan, in which he confidently promises that she “will make the monarchy seem more inclusive and relevant to multicultural Britain”.

Thanks to the young princes, our monarchy is already ‘inclusive and relevant’ enough, in fact more so. The monarchy, along with the church, represents a factor of constancy, which by definition makes it a conservative institution.

Conservative doesn’t mean unchanging, and God knows our monarchy has changed a lot over the centuries. But whatever changes it has undergone (or suffered, depending on your point of view) have been gradual. It’s not the monarchy’s function to accommodate leftish impulses of an American B-actress who believes in her inalienable right to speak her mind, such as it is.

Mr Morton probably doesn’t even realise how scary he sounds when writing that: “According to family friends, Meghan was intrigued by Diana not just for her style but also for her independent humanitarian mission.”

He turns fear into dread when quoting Meghan’s childhood friend, who says that: “She was always fascinated by the Royal Family. She wants to be Princess Diana 2.0.”

Of course she does. And, call me a scaremonger, I’m almost certain she’ll succeed.