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Is it better to be loved or feared?

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
Loved
Better
Feared

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For one change always leaves a dovetail into which another will fit.
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One should never fall in the belief that you can find someone to pick you up.
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One change always leaves the way open for the establishment of others.
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Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.
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Many have dreamed up republics and principalities that have never in truth been known to exist the gulf between how one should live and how one does live is so wide that a man who neglects what is actually done for what should be done learns the way to self-destruction rather than self-preservation.
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With difficulty he is beaten who can estimate his own forces and those of his enemy.
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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.
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You do not know the unfathomable cowardice of humanity...servile in the face of force, pitiless in the face of weakness, implacable before blunders, indulgent before crimes...and patient to the point of martyrdom before all the violences of bold despotism.
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God is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us.
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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.
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Appear as you may wish to be
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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.
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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.
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If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.
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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.
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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.
Niccolo Machiavelli
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The best fortress which a prince can possess is the affection of his people.
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He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command.
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A prince ought to have two fears, one from within, on account of his subjects, the other from without, on account of external powers.
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Men ought either to be well treated or crushed, because they can avenge themselves of lighter injuries, of more serious ones they cannot therefore the injury that is to be done to a man ought to be of such a kind that one does not stand in fear of revenge.
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