His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wicked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLII’m not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.
More Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes
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Never was anything great achieved without danger.
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God is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us.
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If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.
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Nature that framed us of four elements, warring within our breasts for regiment, doth teach us all to have aspiring minds.
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Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain.
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The wish to acquire more is admittedly a very natural and common thing; and when men succeed in this they are always praised rather than condemned.
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The new ruler must determine all the injuries that he will need to inflict. He must inflict them once and for all.
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No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.
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A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man.
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Severities should be dealt out all at once, so that their suddenness may give less offense.
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Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others.
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Before all else, be armed.
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The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.
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A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.
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Tardiness often robs us opportunity, and the dispatch of our forces.
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The main foundations of every state, new states as well as ancient or composite ones, are good laws and good arms you cannot have good laws without good arms, and where there are good arms, good laws inevitably follow.
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Whoever conquers a free town and does not demolish it commits a great error and may expect to be ruined himself.
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Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times.
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Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.
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War should be the only study of a prince. He should consider peace only as a breathing-time, which gives him leisure to contrive, and furnishes as ability to execute, military plans.
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Men shrink less from offending one who inspires love than one who inspires fear.
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The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous.
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But when they lack the ability to do so and yet want to acquire more at all costs, they deserve condemnation for their mistakes.
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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.
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He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command.
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Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims for his deceptions.
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