Florentine author Quotes

“A battle that you win cancels all your mistakes.”

“The wish to acquire is in truth very natural and common, and men always do so when they can.but when they cannot do so, yet wish to do so by any means, then there is folly and blame.”

“Hence it comes about that all armed Prophets have been victorious, and all unarmed Prophets have been destroyed.”

“The sinews of war are not gold, but good soldiers; for gold alone will not procure good soldiers, but good soldiers will always procure gold.”

“Anyone who becomes master of a city accustomed to freedom and does not destroy it may expect to be destroyed by it; for such a city may always justify rebellion in the name of liberty and its ancient institutions.”

“Decide which is the line of conduct that presents the fewest drawbacks and then follow it out as being the best one, because one never finds anything perfectly pure and unmixed, or exempt from danger.”

“The sinews of war are not gold, but good soldiers.”

“The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.”

“In our own days we have seen no princes accomplish great results save those who have been accounted miserly.”

“Among other causes of misfortune which your not being armed brings upon you, it makes you despised.”

“If you only notice human proceedings, you may observe that all who attain great power and riches, make use of either force or fraud; and what they have acquired either by deceit or violence, in order to conceal the disgraceful methods of attainment, they endeavor to sanctify with the false title of honest gains.”

“To be feared is much safer then to be loved.”

“No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.”

“Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasion for it.”

“One can make this generalization about men: they are ungrateful, fickle, liars, and deceivers, they shun danger and are greedy for profit; while you treat them well, they are yours. They would shed their blood for you, risk their property, their lives, their children, so long, as I said above, as danger is remote; but when you are in danger they turn against you.”

“Besides what has been said, people are fickle by nature; and it is a simple to convince them of something but difficult to hold them in that conviction; and, therefore, affairs should be managed in such a way that when they no longer believe, they can be made to believe by force.”

“It makes him contemptible to be considered fickle, frivolous, effeminate, mean-spirited, irresolute, from all of which a prince should guard himself as from a rock; and he should endeavour to show in his actions greatness, courage, gravity, and fortitude; and in his private dealings with his subjects let him show that his judgments are irrevocable, and maintain himself in such reputation that no one can hope either to deceive him or to get round him.”

“To understand the nature of the people one must be a prince, and to understand the nature of the prince, one must be of the people.”

“States that rise quickly, just as all the other things of nature that are born and grow rapidly, cannot have roots and ramifications; the first bad weather kills them”

“A wise prince will seek means by which his subjects will always and in every possible condition of things have need of his government, and then they will always be faithful to him.”

“Men are so simple of mind, and so much dominated by their immediate needs, that a deceitful man will always find plenty who are ready to be deceived.”

“A prince... must learn from the fox and the lion... One must be a fox in order to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten off wolves. Those who act simply as lions are stupid. So it follows that a prudent ruler cannot, and must not, honour his word when it places him at a disadvantage and when the reasons for which he made his promise no longer exist.”

“The one who adapts his policy to the times prospers, and likewise that the one whose policy clashes with the demands of the times does not.”

“Princes and governments are far more dangerous than other elements within society.”

“Always assume incompetence before looking for conspiracy.”