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  • Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes   389
  • Some princes, so as to hold securely the state, have disarmed their subjects, others have kept their subject towns distracted by factions...Our forefathers, and those who were reckoned wise, were accustomed to say that it was necessary to hold Pistoia [an Italian city] by factions and Pisa by fortress, and with this idea they fostered quarrels in some of their tributary towns so as to keep possession of them the more easily.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Wise Quotes , Italian Quotes
  • How laudable it is for a prince to keep good faith and live with integrity, and not with astuteness, every one knows. Still the experience of our times shows those princes to have done great things who have had little regard for good faith, and have been able by astuteness to confuse men's brains, and who have ultimately overcome those who have made loyalty their foundation.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Loyalty Quotes , Art Quotes
  • 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, so that the injury done to a man ought to be such that vengeance cannot be feared.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , War Quotes , Men Quotes
  • Nevertheless, he must be cautious in believing and acting, and must not inspire fear of his own accord, and must proceed in a temperate manner with prudence and humanity, so that too much confidence does not render him incautious, and too much diffidence does not render him intolerant. From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved more than feared, or feared more than loved.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Art Quotes , War Quotes