Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes
The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.
I desire to go to Hell and not to Heaven. In the former I shall enjoy the company of popes, kings and princes, while in the latter are only beggars, monks and apostles
Entrepreneurs are simply those who understand that there is little difference between obstacle and opportunity and are able to turn both to their advantage.
A government which does not trust its citizens to be armed is not itself to be trusted.
Men are so stupid and concerned with their present needs, they will always let themselves be deceived.
It is just as difficult and dangerous to try to free a people that wants to remain servile as it is to enslave a people that wants to remain free.
Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among the great number who are not good.
Power is the pivot on which everything hinges. He who has the power is always right; the weaker is always wrong.
The more sand has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it.
Men in general judge more from appearances than from reality. All men have eyes, but few have the gift of penetration.
Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims for his deceptions.
Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth. Develop the strength to do bold things, not to suffer.
If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.
There is nothing as likely to succeed as what the enemy believes you cannot attempt.
The state is not an organism capable of bringing either moral or material improvements to the populace...but merely a vehicle of power for the men and party in power.
When you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred.
Laa shay'a waqi'un moutlaq bale kouloun moumkine...We work in the Dark, to serve the Light.
Men are so simple of mind, and so much dominated by their immediate needs, that a deceitful man will always find plenty who are ready to be deceived.
There is no other way to guard yourself against flattery than by making men understand that telling you the truth will not offend you.
I hold it to be a proof of great prudence for men to abstain from threats and insulting words toward anyone, for neither diminishes the strength of the enemy.
For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances, as though they were realities, and are often more influenced by the things that seem than by those that are.
No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.
How we live is so different from how we ought to live that he who studies what ought to be done rather than what is done will learn the way to his downfall rather than to his preservation.
A multitude is strong while it holds together, but so soon as each of those who compose it begins ro think of his own private danger, it becomes weak and contemptible.
Half of these aren't even Machiavelli. Some are Plato, Thucydides etc....doesnt anyone check these?
Knowing how to fight made men more bold, because no one fears doing what it seems to him he has learned to do. Therefore, the ancients wanted their citizens to be trained in every warlike action.
Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain.
Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them.