Principles of Morals and

Principles of Morals and Legislation/175
they be of short duration, have seldom the effect of occasioning either
party to be spoken of as being invested with a condition. The particular
occasional services which one man may come, by contract or otherwise,
to be bound to render to another, are innumerably various: but the num-
ber of conditions which have names may be counted, and are, compara-
tively, but few.
XXVI. If after all, notwithstanding the rule here given for separat-
ing conditions from articles of property, any object should present itself
which should appear to be referable, with equal propriety, to either head,
the inconvenience would not be material; since in such cases, as will be
seen a little farther on, whichever appellation were adopted, the list of
the offences, to which the object stands exposed, would be substantially
the same.
These difficulties being cleared up, we now proceed to exhibit an
analytical view of the several possible offences against trust.
XXVII. Offences against trust may be distinguished, in the first
place, into such as concern the existence of the trust in the hands of such
or such a person, and such as concern the exercise of the functions that
belong to it. First then, with regard to such as relate to its existence. An
offence of this description, like one of any other description, if an of-
fence it ought to be, must to some person or other import a prejudice.
This prejudice maybe distinguished into two branches: 1. That which
may fall on such persons as are or should be invested with the trust: 2.
That which may fall on the persons for whose sake it is or should be
instituted, or on other persons at large. To begin with the former of these
branches. Let any trust be conceived. The consequences which it is in
the nature of it to be productive of to the possessor, must, in as far as
they are material, be either of an advantageous or of a disadvantageous
nature: in as far as they are advantageous, the trust may be considered
as a benefit or privilege: in as far as they are disadvantageous, it may be
considered as a burthen. To consider it then upon the footing of a ben-
efit. The trust either is of the number of those which ought by law to
subsist; that is, which the legislator meant should be established; or is
not. If it is, the possession which at any time you may be deprived of,
with respect to it, must at that time be either present or to come: if to
come (in which case it maybe regarded either as certain or as contin-
gent), the investitive event, or event from whence your possession of it
should have taken its commencement, was either an event in the produc-
tion of which the will of the offender should have been instrumental, or

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176/Jeremy Bentham
any other event at large: in the former case, the offence may be termed
wrongful non-investment of trust: in the latter case, wrongful intercep-
tion of trust. If at the time of the offence whereby you are deprived of it,
you were already in possession of it, the offence may be styled wrongful
divestment of trust. Tn any of these cases, the effect of the offence is
either to put somebody else into the trust, or not: if not, it is wrongful
divestment, wrongful interception, or wrongful divestment, and nothing
more: if it be, the person put in possession is either the wrong-doer
himself, in which case it may be styled usurpation of trust; or some
other person, in which case it may be styled wrongful investment, or
attribution, of trust. If the trust in question is not of the number of those
which ought to subsist, it depends upon the manner in which one man
deprives another of it, whether such deprivation shall or shall not be an
offence, and, accordingly, whether non-investment, interception, or di-
vestment, shall or shall not be wrongful. But the putting any body into it
must at any rate be an offence: and this offence may be either usurpation
or wrongful investment, as before.
In the next place, to consider it upon the footing of a burthen. In this
point of view, if no other interest than that of the persons liable to be
invested with it were considered, it is what ought not, upon the principle
of utility, to subsist: if it ought, it can only be for the sake of the persons
in whose favour it is established. If then it ought not on any account to
subsist, neither non-investment, interception, nor divestment, can be
wrongful with relation to the persons first mentioned, whatever they
may be on any other account, in respect of the manner in which they
happen to be performed: for usurpation, though not likely to be commit-
ted, there is the same room as before: so likewise is there for wrongful
investment; which, in as far as the trust is considered as a burthen, may
be styled wrongful imposition of trust. If the trust, being still of the
burthensome kind, is of the number of those which ought to subsist, any
offence that can be committed, with relation to the existence of it, must
consist either in causing a person to be in possession of it, who ought
not to be, or in causing a person not to be in possession of it who ought
to be: in the former case, it must be either usurpation or wrongful di-
vestment, as before: in the latter case, the person who is caused to be not
in possession, is either the wrong-doer himself, or some other: if the
wrong-doer himself, either at the time of the offence he was in posses-
sion of it, or he was not: if he was, it may be termed wrongful abdica-
tion of trust; if not, wrongful detrectation or non-assumption: if the

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