Machiavelli

Niccolo Machiavelli was the author of the Prince, a guide to politics and practical ruling, where he discusses the attainment, management, and utilisation of power. Machiavelli is known for being harsh and blunt. His views do not favour human nature and he generally distrusts people. He may have been unpleasant and a bit disdainful but he’s not a bad person just because he could think rationally and be very candid in his writing.

When he talks about keeping up appearances and how a prince should at least act kind and good, he doesn’t automatically assume the prince really is good. He takes the things that are generally considered in good nature and warps the reader’s view of it. “You hurt yourself only when you give away what is your own. There is nothing so self-defeating as generosity: in the act of practicing it, you lose that ability to do so” (Machiavelli, 53). This quote comes from chapter 16 in which he talks about generosity and the limits there are to it. He assumes the worst in people because it opens up the whole spectrum of who he is talking to. Only assuming the good in people only lets the genuinely good people benefit from his writing, assuming the worst includes the best and worst people. “I say that a prince must want to have a reputation for compassion rather than for cruelty: none the less, he must be careful that he does not make bad use of compassion.” (Machiavelli, 53). He didn’t care about human nature and people being kind, who the prince is, is irrelevant, who he appears to be to the kingdom is what matters.

Machiavelli’s harshness and general disdain for human nature makes him out to be the arch-fiend. He is dislikable, which makes him very hard to read or listen to, but the reality is he is honest. He is uncaring of what a prince would like to hear and blatant about what a prince would need to hear. “Men will always do badly by you unless they are forced to be virtuous.” (Machiavelli, 77) Advice