This is a tricky question that I am not sure I should even ask, but here it is:
A few years ago, I read something online about Tolkien's works, especially LotR and The Silmarillion. It related to either Sauron or Saruman (or possibly - though I doubt it - Melkor/Morgoth), and the gist was as follows.
Before he was pure evil, this character was basically a decent guy, although he was very egotistical. He saw suffering, death, war, hunger, hatred, chaos, cruelty, misery, sorrow, disease, etc, in the world, and it deeply troubled him. He thought that, if he was in charge, he could ease people's suffering, do away with all these terrible things, and make the world a better place in which to live. So began his quest for power over all of Arda, but for ostensibly good reasons (compared to the reasons most people try to obtain great power).
But as we all know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and this is no exception. He found, unsurprisingly, that everyone else wanted to be in charge too, which is why so much warfare existed. Everyone was fighting everyone else for control, and the only thing they could all agree upon was that they didn't want HIM in charge. They fought him tooth and nail, and weren't interested in his promises to make everything better for them.
His ego got the better of him, he saw their resistance as insolence and self-destructive willfulness, and he grew angry. He gradually stopped caring about improving the world, and soon sought to take control only so he could punish these pathetic wretches for their intransigence. And so the well-meaning narcissist became truly evil. His condescending benevolence turned into a lust for power for its own sake, and his self-impressed desire to help people gave way to an all-consuming quest for vengeance against those who had rejected and opposed him. In the end, rather than reducing or eliminating the amount of suffering, hatred, death, chaos, warfare, cruelty, and misery in the world, he greatly increased it.
I am SURE I read this (though not in these exact words) online, and the source seemed to be quite knowledgeable about such things. I can no longer remember WHO the story referred to (or where I found it), but I was certain it was either Sauron, Saruman, or Melkor (the latter seems all but impossible now, because I have learned that Melkor was trying to destroy the world before anyone even lived there, and in fact, before it existed; I lean towards thinking it was actually Sauron, but I have nothing to base that on, so it could very well be Saruman).
Does anyone know what I am babbling about - does any of this sound familiar? Who does this account refer to?