Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli Quotes
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Cruelties should be committed all at once.
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One can generally say this about men: that they are ungrateful, fickle, simulators and deceivers, avoiders of danger, greedy for gain; and while you work for their good they are completely yours, offering you their blood, their property, their lives, and their sons when danger is far away; but when it comes nearer to you, they turn away.
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Men judge generally more by the eye than by the hand, for everyone can see and few can feel. Every one sees what you appear to be, few really know what you are.
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Laa shay'a waqi'un moutlaq bale kouloun moumkine...We work in the Dark, to serve the Light.
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A battle that you win cancels all your mistakes.
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Tardiness often robs us opportunity, and the dispatch of our forces.
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A wise man ought always to follow the paths beaten by great men, and to imitate those who have been supreme, so that if his ability does not equal theirs, at least it will savor of it. Let him act like the clever archers who, designing to hit the mark which yet appears too far distant, and knowing the limits to which the strength of their bow attains, take aim much higher than the mark, not to reach by their strength or arrow to so great a height, but to be able with the aid of so high an aim to hit the mark they wish to reach.
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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.
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They have not any difficulties on the way up because they fly, but they have many when they reach the summit.
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Men are more ready to offend one who desires to be beloved than one who wishes to be feared.
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There is nothing as likely to succeed as what the enemy believes you cannot attempt.
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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.
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Speaking generally, men are ungrateful, fickle, hypocritical, fearful odanger and covetous ogain.
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Therefore, it is necessary to be a fox to discover the snares and a lion to terrify the wolves...
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The more sand has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it.
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The state is not an organism capable of bringing either moral or material improvements to the populace...but merely a vehicle of power for the men and party in power.
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And when neither their property nor honour is touched, the majority of men live content, and he has only to contend with the ambition of a few, whom he can curb with ease in many ways.
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God creates men, but they choose each other.
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The leader should know how to enter into evil when necessity commands.
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Men are able to assist fortune but not to thwart her. They can weave her designs, but they cannot destroy them.
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A son could bear with great complacency, the death of his father, while the loss of his inheritance might drive him to despair.
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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.
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Only those means of security are good, are certain, are lasting, that depend on yourself and your own vigor.
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The people resemble a wild beast, which, naturally fierce and accustomed to live in the woods, has been brought up, as it were, in a prison and in servitude, and having by accident got its liberty, not being accustomed to search for its food, and not knowing where to conceal itself, easily becomes the prey of the first who seeks to incarcerate it again.