The servants of the Republic do not grow rich in her service as easily as people think.

Since the sovereign is no longer there to distribute favours, each of them takes what he can, and his depredations, limited by the depredations of all the others, are reduced to modest proportions.

Hence that austerity of morals that is noticed in democratic leaders.

They can only grow rich during periods of great business activity and then they find themselves exposed to the envy of their less favoured colleagues.

Hippolyte Ceres had for a long time foreseen such a period.