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.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLINo enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.
More Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes
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The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.
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Men are so simple and yield so readily to the desires of the moment that he who will trick will always find another who will suffer to be tricked.
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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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So that the injury done to a man ought to be such that vengeance cannot be feared.
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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.
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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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Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.
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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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He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command.
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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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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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It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.
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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.
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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.
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Benefits should be conferred gradually; and in that way they will taste better.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI