• Categories
  • Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes   389
  • It should be borne in mind that there is nothing more difficult to arrange, more doubtful of success, and more dangerous to carry through than initiating changes. The innovator makes enemies of all those who prospered under the old order, and only lukewarm support is forthcoming from those who would prosper under the new. Their support is lukewarm ... partly because men are generally incredulous, never really trusting new things unless they have tested them by experience.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Change Quotes , Men Quotes
  • If the chief party, whether it be the people, or the army, or the nobility, which you think most useful and of most consequence to you for the conservation of your dignity, be corrupt, you must follow their humor and indulge them, and in that case honesty and virtue are pernicious.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Honesty Quotes , Party Quotes
  • 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
  • You must never believe that the enemy does not know how to conduct his own affairs. Indeed, if you want to be deceived less and want to bear less danger, the more the enemy is weak or the less the enemy is cautious, so much more must you esteem him.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Art Quotes , War Quotes
  • One can generally say this about men: that they are ungrateful, fickle, simulators and deceivers, avoiders of danger, greedy for gain; and while you work for their good they are completely yours, offering you their blood, their property, their lives, and their sons when danger is far away; but when it comes nearer to you, they turn away.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Philosophical Quotes , Son Quotes
  • Still, a prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any rate avoids hatred; for fear and the absence of hatred may well go together, and will be always attained by one who abstains from interfering with the property of his citizens and subjects or with their women.
  • 5 years ago



    Tags : Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes , Art Quotes , War Quotes