Quotes from Niccolo Machiavelli

For love is held by the tie of obligation, which, because men are a sorry breed, is broken on every whisper of private interest; but fear is bound by the apprehension of punishment which never relaxes its grasp.

Armour belonging to someone else either chops off you or weighs you down or is too tight

One of the best and most efficacious methods for dealing with such a State, is for the Prince who acquires it to go and dwell there in person, since this will tend to make his tenure more secure and lasting.

Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.

Never was anything great achieved without danger

And it ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things

You must know, then, that there are two methods of fighting, the one by law, the other by force: the first method is that of men, the second of beasts; but as the first method is often insufficient, one must have recourse to the second. It is therefore necessary to know well how to use both the beast and the man.

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

Fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails.

We're all players in a game. You're a player or a piece on the board, you move or you're moved. You play the game or the game plays you.

he who is the cause of another becoming powerful is ruined because that predominance has been brought about either by astuteness or else by force, and both are distrusted by him who has been raised to power.

From want of foresight men make changes which relishing well at first do not betray their hidden venom, as I have already observed respecting hectic fever. Nevertheless, the ruler is not truly wise who cannot discern evils before they develop themselves, and this is a faculty given to few.

I have not found among my possessions anything which I hold more dear than, or value so much as, the knowledge of the actions of great men, acquired by long experience in contemporary affairs and a continual study of antiquity, which, having reflected upon it with great and prolonged diligence, I now send, digested into a little volume, to your Magnificence.

Without doubt, princes become great when they overcome difficulties and hurdles put in their path. When fortune wants to advance a new prince... She creates enemies for him, making them launch campaigns against him so that he is compelled to overcome them and climb higher on the ladder that they have brought him. Therefore, many judge that a wise prince must skillfully fan some enmity whenever the opportunity arises, so that in crushing it he will increase his standing.

above all things he must keep his hands off the property of others, because men more quickly forget the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony. Besides

Because, if one is on the spot, disorders are seen as they spring up, and one can quickly remedy them; but if one is not at hand, they are heard of only when they are great, and then one can no longer remedy them.

Men are more apt to be mistaken in their generalizations than in their particular observations

For one change always leaves the toothing for another.

no es victoria verdadera la que se obtiene con armas ajenas.

exactly to those paths which others have taken, or attain to the virtues of those whom they would resemble, the wise man should always follow the roads that have been trodden by the great, and imitate those who have most excelled, so that if he cannot reach their perfection, he may at least acquire something of its savour.

These reflections prompt the question: is it better to be loved rather than feared, or vice versa? The answer is that one would prefer to be both but, since they don't go together easily, if you have to choose, it's much safer to be feared than loved. We

Whenever those states, which have been acquired as stated, have been accustomed to live under their own laws and in freedom, there are three courses for those who wish to hold them: the first is to ruin them, the next is to reside there in person, the third is to permit them to live under their own laws, drawing a tribute, and establishing within it an oligarchy which will keep it friendly to you.

I believe that he will prosper most whose mode of acting best adapts itself to the character of the times; and conversely that he will be unprosperous, with whose mode of acting the times do not accord.

This it happens in affairs of state, for when the evils that arise have been foreseen (which it is only given to a wise man to see), they can be quickly redressed, but when, through not having been foreseen, they have been permitted to grow in a way that every one can see them, there is no longer a remedy.