The Prince

you wish to please me, and to bring success and honour to yourself, do right and study, because others will help you if you help yourself."

Men will not look at things as they really are, but as they wish them to be—and are ruined

Men will not look at things as they really are, but as they wish them to be—and are ruined

For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new. This lukewarm temper arises partly from the fear of adversaries who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who will never admit the merit of anything new, until they have seen it proved by the event.

I have wished either that no hon­our should be given it, or else that the truth of the mat­ter and the weight­i­ness of the theme shall make it ac­cept­able.

Ma­chiavelli has painted Ferdin­and of Aragon as the man who ac­com­plished great things un­der the cloak of re­li­gion, but who in real­ity had no mercy, faith, hu­man­ity, or in­teg­rity; and who, had he al­lowed him­self to be in­flu­enced by such motives, would have been ruined.

is in ref­er­ence to Pope Julius that Ma­chiavelli mor­al­izes on the re­semb­lance between For­tune and wo­men, and con­cludes that it is the bold rather than the cau­tious man that will win and hold them both.

Know­ledge doth come of learn­ing well re­tained,
Un­fruit­ful else,

III Concerning Mixed Principalities

We have not seen great things done in our time ex­cept by those who have been con­sidered mean; the rest have failed.