国王又说：“嗯！嗯！我想，这个星球的某个处统统一只老鼠。夜里，我闻声它的声音。你能够审判它，每隔一段时候你就判处它极刑。是以它的生命取决于你的讯断。但是，你每次判刑后都要赦免它，我们必须有节制地对待这只老鼠，因为我们只要这一只老鼠。”
"If I ordered a general," he would say, by way of example, "if I ordered a general to change himself into a sea bird, and if the general did not obey me, that would not be the fault of the general. It would be my fault.""May I sit down" came now a timid inquiry from the little prince.
“你能够审判本身，”国王答复说，“这但是世上最难的事情。审判本身比审判别人要难很多啊！如果你能精确地审判本身，你就是一个真正聪明的人。”
国王最在乎的是要保持他的权威遭到尊敬。他不能容忍别人违方号令。他是一名绝对的君主。但是，他却很仁慈，他下的号令都是合情公道的。
"Certainly they do," the king said. "They obey instantly. I do not permit insubordination."Such power was a thing for the little prince to marvel at. If he had been master of such complete authority, he would have been able to watch the sunset, not forty-four times in one day, but seventy-two, or even a hundred, or even two hundred times, with out ever having to move his chair. And because he felt a bit sad as he remembered his little planet which he had forsaken, he plucked up his courage to ask the king a favor:"I should like to see a sunset... do me that kindness... Order the sun to set...""If I ordered a general to fly from one flower to another like a butterfly, or to write a tragic drama, or to change himself into a sea bird, and if the general did not carry out the order that he had received, which one of us would be in the wrong" the king demanded. "The general, or myself""You," said the little prince firmly.