[clxiv. 222]

1820 June 27

Emancipation Spanish

?.8. Corruptive influence

Corruption without Corrupter

The essence of the mischief /evil/ consists in the existence, in the hands of one or of the few, of a power adequate to the purpose of sacrificing to their own narrow interest the broader interest of the many: corruptive influence is productive /a source/ of evil no otherwise than so far as it is productive of this effect. In /Under/ a pure despotism no corruptive influence it has been already remarked is exercised on the under despots by the despot in chief on the under despots: why because he has no need of going to work in a way so less sure and at the same time so expensive: by force military force, when once it is collected and established, no additional expence is necessitated for the making application of it to this or any other purpose: it costs no more to fire a ball into the bowels of a petitioner for reform than into a target

Accordingly where by the situation a man occupies in the government and by the power attached to that situation he finds himself enabled to put himself into the possession of a mass of the external instruments of felicity in any shape or shapes, to put into his purse /pocket/ for example the matter of depredation in any shape it matters not whether a special corrupter can or can not be found for him in the persons of any other functionary.

If merely by occupying the situation of Chancellor it is in the power of a man at the expence of insolvent debtors and their impoverished creditors to fill with fees his own pockets in that character, and those of his sons or other dependents /worshippers/ whom he would or would not otherwise have had to feed /provide for/ at his own expence in the situation of Commissioner, it makes no difference with regard to the temptation he is under of adding to the public misery for the sake of adding to those emoluments whether he receives this part of his emolument from the hands /at the hands/ of a Corrupter General by a separate deed, or whether without need of application to that primary author of all evil he puts /sweeps/ the money into his purse by means of a power attached already to his office.