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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 di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
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When they remain in garrison, soldiers are maintained with fear and punishment; when they are then led to war, with hope and reward.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
A prince being thus obliged to know well how to act as a beast must imitate the fox and the lion, for the lion cannot protect himself from snares, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
There is simply no comparison between a man who is armed and one who is not. It is simply unreasonable to expect that an armed man should obey one who is unarmed, or that an unarmed man should remain safe and secure when his servants are armed.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
The innovator has for enemies all who have done well under the old, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
I'm not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
It may be observed, that provinces amid the vicissitudes to which they are subject, pass from order into confusion, and afterward recur to a state of order again; for the nature of mundane affairs not allowing them to continue in an even course, when they have arrived at their greatest perfection, they soon begin to decline.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
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....those who become princes through their skill acquire the pricipality with difficulty, buy they hold onto it with ease.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
When you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
A prudent man should always follow in the path trodden by great men and imitate those who are most excellent, so that if he does not attain to their greatness, at any rate he will get some tinge of it.A prudent man should always follow in the path trodden by great men and imitate those who are most excellent, so that if he does not attain to their greatness, at any rate he will get some tinge of it.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
Men ought either to be well treated, or crushed.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
...it is a base thing to look to others for your defense instead of depending upon yourself. That defense alone is effectual, sure, and durable which depends upon yourself and your own valor.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
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He who desires or attempts to reform the government of a state and wishes to have it accepted, must at least retain the semblance of the old forms; so that it may seem to the people that there has been no change in the institutions, even though in fact they are entirely different from the old ones. For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances, as though they were realities.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
I hold strongly to this: that it is better to be impetuous than circumspect; because fortune is a woman and if she is to be submissive it is necessary to beat and coerce her.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
War brings out thieves and peace hangs them.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
For the mob is always impressed by appearances and by results, and the world is composed of the mob.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
I hold it to be of great prudence for men to abstain from threats and insulting words towards any one, for neither the one nor the other in any way diminishes the strength of the enemy; but the one makes him more cautious, and the other increases his hatred of you, and makes him more persevering in his efforts to injure you...
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
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Rome remained free for four hundred years and Sparta eight hundred, although their citizens were armed all that time; but many other states that have been disarmed have lost their liberties in less than forty years.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
And when he is obliged to take the life of any one, to do so when there is a proper justification and manifest reason for it; but above all he must abstain from taking the property of others, for men forget more easily the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
Speaking generally, men are ungrateful, fickle, hypocritical, fearful odanger and covetous ogain.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli -
Because there are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is the most excellent, the second is good, the third is useless.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli