511 Quotes by Niccolò Machiavelli

If One Wishes That a Sect of a Republic Live a Long Time, It Is Necessary to Draw It Back Often toward Its Principle

Without doubt, ferocious and disordered men are much weaker than timid and ordered ones. For order chases fear from men and disorder lessens ferocity.

....for friendships that are acquired by a price and not by greatness and nobility of character are purchased but are not owned, and at the proper moment they cannot be spent.

And when he is obliged to take the life of any one, to do so when there is a proper justification and manifest reason for it; but above all he must abstain from taking the property of others, for men forget more easily the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony.

The question is, then, do we try to make things easy on ourselves or do we try to make things easy on our customers, whoever they may be?

....nothing is so unhealthy or unstable as the reputation for power that is not based on one's own power.

Results are often obtained by impetuosity and daring which could never have been obtained by ordinary methods.

It is necessary that the prince should know how to color his nature well, and how to be a hypocrite and dissembler. For men are so simple, and yield so much to immediate necessity, that the deceiver will never lack dupes.

Wise men say, and not without reason, that whoever wished to foresee the future might consult the past.