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I'm not interested in preserving the status quo I want to overthrow it.

Niccolo Machiavelli

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Niccolo Machiavelli
Age: 58 †
Born: 1469
Born: May 3
Died: 1527
Died: June 22
Diplomat
Historian
Military Theorist
Philosopher
Playwright
Poet
Political Theorist
Politician
Translator
Writer
Florence
Tuscany
Nicolo Machiavelli
Niccolo Machiavelli
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
Nicolò Machiavelli
N. Machiavelli
Niccolo di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
Machiavelli
Overthrow
Preserving
Status
Thrive
Philosophical
Interested

More quotes by Niccolo Machiavelli

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There are three kinds of brains: One understands of itself, another can be taught to understand, and the third can neither understand to itself or be taught to understand.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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As all those have shown who have discussed civil institutions, and as every history is full of examples, it is necessary to whoever arranges to found a Republic and establish laws in it, to presuppose that all men are bad and that they will use their malignity of mind every time they have the opportunity.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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Any harm you do to a man should be done in such a way that you need not fear his revenge.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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Everyone who wants to know what will happen ought to examine what has happened: everything in this world in any epoch has their replicas in antiquity.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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When they remain in garrison, soldiers are maintained with fear and punishment when they are then led to war, with hope and reward.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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If the present be compared with the remote past, it is easily seen that in all cities and in all peoples there are the same desires and the same passions as there always were.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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Men are less hesitant about harming someone who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared because love is held together by a chain of obligation which, since men are wretched creatures, is broken on every occasion in which their own interests are concerned but fear is sustained by dread of punishment which will never abandon you.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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....for friendships that are acquired by a price and not by greatness and nobility of character are purchased but are not owned, and at the proper moment they cannot be spent.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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When men receive favours from someone they expected to do them ill, they are under a greater obligation to their benefactor.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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For government consists in nothing else but so controlling subjects that they shall neither be able to, nor have cause to do [it] harm.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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And it will always happen that he who is not your friend will request your neutrality and he who is your friend will ask you to declare yourself by taking up arms. And irresolute princes, in order to avoid present dangers, follow the neutral road most of the time, and most of the time they are ruined.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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For as good habits of the people require good laws to support them, so laws, to be observed, need good habits on the part of the people.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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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.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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Forgiveness proceeds from a generous soul.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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To keep your actions and your plans secret always has been a very good thing . .. Marcus Crassus said to one who asked him when he was going to move the army: 'Do you believe that you will be the only one not to hear the trumpet?
Niccolo Machiavelli
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To know well the nature of the people one must be a prince, and to know well the nature of princes one must be of the people.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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A prince is also respected when he is a true friend and a true enemy that is, when he declares himself on the side of one prince against another without any reservation.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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The peasant wants only to be left alone to prosper in peace.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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You must know, then, that there are two methods of fighting, the one by law, the other by force: the first method is that of men, the second of beasts but as the first method is often insufficient, one must have recourse to the second.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.
Niccolo Machiavelli