It is not the giving of the bribe but the taking that is base

It is not the giving of the bribe that distresses us but the action of the man who takes it, if it is directed against our interests. Demades. On the Twelve Years. Speech 1. Section 21.

Soldier of the Imperial Body Guard (Praetorian) from the pedestal of a triumphal arch for the Emperor Trajan, early 2nd century CE found around 1800 in Pozzuoli, now in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Albert Krantz.