29 Quotes About Machiavelli

Do not talk of rights, else politics would startScales would come out, haggling would start

Therefore a wise prince ought to adopt such a course that his citizens will always in every sort and kind of circumstance have need of the state and of him, and then he will always find them faithful.

We are much beholden to Machiavelli and others, that write what men do, and not what they ought to do.

From this arises the following question: whether it is better to be loved than feared, or the reverse. The answer is that one would like to be both the one and the other, but because they are difficult to combine, it is far better to be loved than feared if you cannot be both.

Do you are laugh because you are successful or because another one is unfortunate?

I felt mischievous, clever, triumphant, sad—though perhaps the dominant emotion was really this last. I felt like a mildly melancholic Mrs Machiavelli, already ashamed of her duplicity.

These opportunities, then, gave these men the chance they needed, and their great abilities made them recognize it.

Without an opportunity, their abilities would have been wasted, and without their abilities, the opportunity would have arisen in vain.

Those who believe that where great personages are concerned new favors cause old injuries to be forgotten deceive themselves.