A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLIWhere the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.
More Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes
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It is much more secure to be feared than to be loved.
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It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.
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Benefits ought to be handed ought drop by drop, so that they may be relished the more.
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Men should be either treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries – for heavy ones they cannot.
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Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times.
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Benefits should be conferred gradually; and in that way they will taste better.
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War is just when it is necessary; arms are permissible when there is no hope except in arms.
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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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Since it is difficult to join them together, it is safer to be feared than to be loved when one of the two must be lacking.
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This first kind is excellent, the second good, and the third kind useless.
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The distinction between children and adults, while probably useful for some purposes, is at bottom a specious one, I feel. There are only individual egos, crazy for love.
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There are three kinds of intelligence: one kind understands things for itself, the other appreciates what others can understand, the third understands neither for itself nor through others.
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The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.
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A prince never lacks legitimate reasons to break his promise.
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It is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI