The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLIWar 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.
More Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes
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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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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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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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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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War is just when it is necessary; arms are permissible when there is no hope except in arms.
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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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Men ought either to be indulged or utterly destroyed, for if you merely offend them they take vengeance, but if you injure them greatly they are unable to retaliate.
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A son can bear with equanimity the loss of his father, but the loss of his inheritance may drive him to despair.
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I’m not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.
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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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We cannot attribute to fortune or virtue that which is achieved without either.
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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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Never was anything great achieved without danger.
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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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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.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI