Page:In Korea with Marquis Ito (1908).djvu/324

290 bent upon securing the royal favor and the offices and emoluments that go therewith." In another work of the same author we are told: "From that day onward (middle of the sixteenth century) politics has been a war of factions, struggling for wealth and power, with no scruples against murder or other crime." The Koreans are, indeed, given to the formation of societies and parties of various descriptions; the more improper or nearly impossible are the ends to be reached, and the more clandestine and illicit the means employed, the greater the temporary enthusiasm which they are likely to excite. All these parties have therefore one plank and one plan of action: to get the ear of the king, to seize upon and control the office-making power, and so to put in every lucrative or honorable position their own partisans. It is "the spoils system sublimated"; for there is "absolutely no admixture of any other element."

On the other hand, this same factional and corrupt spirit among the ruling classes has made it certain that, "however good a statesman a man might be, the other side would try to get his head removed from his shoulders at the first opportunity; and the more distinguished he became, the greater this desire would be. From that time (again the middle of the sixteenth century) to this, almost all the really great men of Korea have met a violent death." . . . "No matter how long one lives in this country, he will never get to understand how a people can possibly drop to such a low estate as to be willing to live without the remotest hope of receiving even-handed justice. Not a week passes but you come in personal contact with cases of injustice and brutality that would mean a riot in any civilized country."

As to the public justice when administered by such a ruling class, this has actually been what might have been