Nicolo Machiavelli

Occasionally words must serve to veil the facts. But this must happen in such a way that no one becomes aware of it; or, if it should be noticed, excuses must be at hand, to be produced immediately.

For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances as though they were realities. and are often more influenced by things that seem than by those that are.

Rome remained free for four hundred years and Sparta eight hundred, although their citizens were armed all that time; but many other states that have been disarmed have lost their liberties in less than forty years.

Government consists in nothing else but so controlling subjects that they shall neither be able to, nor have cause to do it harm.

War should be the only study of a prince.

Men rise from one ambition to another. First they seek to secure themselves from attack, and then they attack others.

It is better to be bold than too circumspect, because fortune is of a sex which likes not a tardy wooer and repulses all who are not ardent.

Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied.

Rhis is to be asserted in general of men: that they are ungrateful, fickle, false, cowardly, covetous, and as long as you succeed, are yours entirely; they will offer you their blood, property, life, and children...when the need is far distant; but when it approaches, they will turn against you.

There are three kinds of intelligence: one kind understands things for itself, the other appreciates what others can understand, the third understands neither for itself nor through others. This first is excellent, the second good, and the third useless.

It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of success nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who profit by the preservation of the old institution and merely lukewarm defenders in those who would gain by the new one.