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More about Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli -
The Prince
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So long as the great majority of men are not deprived of either property or honour, they are satisfied.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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And therefore a prince who does not understand the art of war, over and above the other misfortunes already mentioned, cannot be respected by his soldiers, nor can he rely on them. He ought never, therefore, to have out of his thoughts this subject of war, and in peace he should addict himself more to its exercise than in war; this he can do in two ways, the one by action, the other by study.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Where the very safety of the country depends upon the resolution to be taken, no consideration of justice or injustice, humanity or cruelty, nor of glory or of shame, should be allowed to prevail. But putting all other considerations aside, the only question should be: What course will save the life and liberty of the country?
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Prudence therefore consists in knowing how to distinguish degrees of disadvantage,
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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It has always been the opinion and judgment of wise men that nothing can be so uncertain as fame or power not founded on its own strength.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Some princes, so as to hold securely the state, have disarmed their subjects, others have kept their subject towns distracted by factions...Our forefathers, and those who were reckoned wise, were accustomed to say that it was necessary to hold Pistoia [an Italian city] by factions and Pisa by fortress, and with this idea they fostered quarrels in some of their tributary towns so as to keep possession of them the more easily.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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A prince need trouble little about conspiracies when the people are well disposed, but when they are hostile and hold him in hatred, then he must fear everything and everybody.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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He who has not first laid his foundations may be able with great ability to lay them afterwards, but they will be laid with trouble to the architect and danger to the building.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Men are always averse to enterprises in which they foresee difficulties.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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A wise ruler should rely on what is under his own control, not on what is under the control of others.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Although deceit is detestable in all other things, yet in the conduct of war it is laudable and honorable; and a commander who vanquishes an enemy by stratagem is equally praised with one who gains victory by force.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Thus it happens in matters of state; for knowing afar off (which it is only given a prudent man to do) the evils that are brewing, they are easily cured. But when, for want of such knowledge, they are allowed to grow so that everyone can recognize them, there is no longer any remedy to be found.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Benefits should be granted little by little, so that they may be better enjoyed.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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We have not seen great things done in our time except by those who have been considered mean; the rest have failed.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Whoever is the cause of another becoming powerful, is ruined himself; for that power is produced by him either through craft or force; and both of these are suspected by the one who has been raised to power.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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So far as he is able, a prince should stick to the path of good but, if the necessity arises, he should know how to follow evil.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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For among other evils caused by being disarmed, it renders you contemptible; which is one of those disgraceful things which a prince must guard against.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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How laudable it is for a prince to keep good faith and live with integrity, and not with astuteness, every one knows. Still the experience of our times shows those princes to have done great things who have had little regard for good faith, and have been able by astuteness to confuse men's brains, and who have ultimately overcome those who have made loyalty their foundation.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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And truly it is a very natural and ordinary thing to desire to acquire, and always, when men do it who can, they will be praised or not blamed; but when they cannot, and wish to do it anyway, here lies the error and the blame.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather bring about his own ruin than his preservation.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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A man who wishes to act entirely up to his professions of virtue soon meets with what destroys him among so much that is evil.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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There is nothing more important than appearing to be religious.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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But in Republics there is a stronger vitality, a fiercer hatred, a keener thirst for revenge. The memory of their former freedom will not let them rest; so that the safest course is either to destroy them, or to go and live in them.
Niccolò Machiavelli
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Quote of the day
Life is not having been told that the man has just waxed the floor.
Ogden Nash
Niccolò Machiavelli
Creative Commons
Born:
May 3, 1469
Died:
June 21, 1527
(aged 58)
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