La Bouzole. It is not venal—that's the truth. Among our four thousand magistrates you might perhaps not find one—you hear me, not one—even among the poorest and most obscure—who would accept a money bribe in order to modify his judgment. That is the glory of our country's magistracy and its special virtue. But a great number of our magistrates are ready to be complaisant—even to give way—when it is a question of making themselves agreeable to an influential elector, or to the deputy, or to the minister who distributes appointments and favors. Universal suffrage is the god and the tyrant of the magistrate. So you are right—and I am not wrong.
Ardeuil. Nothing can deprive us of our independence.
La Bouzole. That is so. But, as Monsieur de Tocqueville once remarked, we can offer it up as a sacrifice.
Ardeuil. You are a misanthrope. There are magistrates whom no promise of any kind—
La Bouzole. Yes, there are. Those who are not needy or who have no ambitions. Yes, there are obscure persons who devote their whole lives to their professions and who never ask for anything for themselves. But you can take my word for it that they are the exceptions, and that our Court of Mauleon, which you yourself have seen, represents about the average of our judicial morality. I exaggerate, you think? Well! Let us suppose that in all France there are only fifty Courts like this. Suppose there are only twenty—suppose there is only one. It is still one too many! Why, my young friend, what sort of an idea have you got of the magistracy?
Ardeuil. It frightens me.
La Bouzole. You are speaking seriously?
Ardeuil. Certainly.
La Bouzole. Then why did you become a substitute?
Ardeuil. Through no choice of my own! My people pushed me into the profession.