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1Machiavelli was undoubtedly a man of great observation, acuteness, and industry; noting with appreciative eye whatever
2passed before him, and with his supreme literary gift turning it to account in his enforced retirement from affairs. He
3does not present himself, nor is he depicted by his contemporaries, as a type of that rare combination, the successful
4statesman and author, for he appears to have been only moderately prosperous in his several embassies and political
5employments. He was misled by Catherina Sforza, ignored by Louis XII, overawed by Cesare Borgia; several of his
6embassies were quite barren of results; his attempts to fortify Florence failed, and the soldiery that he raised
7astonished everybody by their cowardice. In the conduct of his own affairs he was timid and time-serving; he dared not
8appear by the side of Soderini, to whom he owed so much, for fear of compromising himself; his connection with the
9Medici was open to suspicion, and Giuliano appears to have recognized his real forte when he set him to write the
10"History of Florence," rather than employ him in the state. And it is on the literary side of his character, and there
11alone, that we find no weakness and no failure. Although the light of almost four centuries has been focused on The
12Prince, its problems are still debatable and interesting, because they are the eternal problems between the ruled and
13their rulers. Such as they are, its ethics are those of Machiavelli's contemporaries; yet they cannot be said to be out
14of date so long as the governments of Europe rely on material rather than on moral forces. Its historical incidents and
15personages become interesting by reason of the uses which Machiavelli makes of them to illustrate his theories of
16government and conduct. Leaving out of consideration those maxims of state which still furnish some European and eastern
17statesmen with principles of action, The Prince is bestrewn with truths that can be proved at every turn. Men are still
18the dupes of their simplicity and greed, as they were in the days of Alexander VI. The cloak of religion still conceals
19the vices which Machiavelli laid bare in the character of Ferdinand of Aragon. Men will not look at things as they
20really are, but as they wish them to be--and are ruined. In politics there are no perfectly safe courses; prudence
21consists in choosing the least dangerous ones. Then--to pass to a higher plane--Machiavelli reiterates that, although
22crimes may win an empire, they do not win glory. Necessary wars are just wars, and the arms of a nation are hallowed
23when it has no other resource but to fight. It is the cry of a far later day than Machiavelli's that government should
24be elevated into a living moral force, capable of inspiring the people with a just recognition of the fundamental
25principles of society; to this "high argument" The Prince contributes but little. Machiavelli always refused to write
26either of men or of governments otherwise than as he found them, and he writes with such skill and insight that his work
27is of abiding value. But what invests The Prince with more than a merely artistic or historical interest is the
28incontrovertible truth that it deals with the great principles which still guide nations and rulers in their
29relationship with each other and their neighbours. In translating The Prince my aim has been to achieve at all costs an
30exact literal rendering of the original, rather than a fluent paraphrase adapted to the modern notions of style and
31expression. Machiavelli was no facile phrasemonger; the conditions under which he wrote obliged him to weigh every word;
32his themes were lofty, his substance grave, his manner nobly plain and serious. Quis eo fuit unquam in partiundis rebus,
33in definiendis, in explanandis pressior? In The Prince, it may be truly said, there is reason assignable, not only for
34every word, but for the position of every word. To an Englishman of Shakespeare's time the translation of such a
35treatise was in some ways a comparatively easy task, for in those times the genius of the English more nearly resembled
36that of the Italian language; to the Englishman of to-day it is not so simple. To take a single example: the word
37intrattenere, employed by Machiavelli to indicate the policy adopted by the Roman Senate towards the weaker states of
38Greece, would by an Elizabethan be correctly rendered "entertain," and every contemporary reader would understand what
39was meant by saying that "Rome entertained the Ætolians and the Achaeans without augmenting their power." But to-day
40such a phrase would seem obsolete and ambiguous, if not unmeaning: we are compelled to say that "Rome maintained
41friendly relations with the Ætolians," etc., using four words to do the work of one. I have tried to preserve the pithy
42brevity of the Italian so far as was consistent with an absolute fidelity to the sense. If the result be an occasional
43asperity I can only hope that the reader, in his eagerness to reach the author's meaning, may overlook the roughness of
44the road that leads him to it. The following is a list of the works of Machiavelli: Principal works. Discorso sopra le
45cose di Pisa, 1499; Del modo di trattare i popoli della Valdichiana ribellati, 1502; Del modo tenuto dal duca Valentino
46nell' ammazzare Vitellozzo Vitelli, Oliverotto da Fermo, etc., 1502; Discorso sopra la provisione del danaro, 1502;
47Decennale primo (poem in terza rima), 1506; Ritratti delle cose dell' Alemagna, 1508-12; Decennale secondo, 1509;
48Ritratti delle cose di Francia, 1510; Discorsi sopra la prima deca di T. Livio, 3 vols., 1512-17; Il Principe, 1513;
49Andria, comedy translated from Terence, 1513 (?); Mandragola, prose comedy in five acts, with prologue in verse, 1513;
50Della lingua (dialogue), 1514; Clizia, comedy in prose, 1515 (?); Belfagor arcidiavolo (novel), 1515; Asino d'oro (poem
51in terza rima), 1517; Dell' arte della guerra, 1519-20; Discorso sopra il riformare lo stato di Firenze, 1520; Sommario
52delle cose della citta di Lucca, 1520; Vita di Castruccio Castracani da Lucca, 1520; Istorie fiorentine, 8 books,
531521-5; Frammenti storici, 1525. Other poems include Sonetti, Canzoni, Ottave, and Canti carnascialeschi. Editions.
54Aldo, Venice, 1546; della Tertina, 1550; Cambiagi, Florence, 6 vols., 1782-5; dei Classici, Milan, 10 1813; Silvestri, 9
55vols., 1820-2; Passerini, Fanfani, Milanesi, 6 vols. only published, 1873-7. Minor works. Ed. F. L. Polidori, 1852;
56Lettere familiari, ed. E. Alvisi, 1883, 2 editions, one with excisions; Credited Writings, ed. G. Canestrini, 1857;
57Letters to F. Vettori, see A. Ridolfi, Pensieri intorno allo scopo di N. Machiavelli nel libro Il Principe, etc.; D.
58Ferrara, The Private Correspondence of Nicolo Machiavelli, 1929. DEDICATION To the Magnificent Lorenzo Di Piero De'
59Medici Those who strive to obtain the good graces of a prince are accustomed to come before him with such things as they
60hold most precious, or in which they see him take most delight; whence one often sees horses, arms, cloth of gold,
61precious stones, and similar ornaments presented to princes, worthy of their greatness. Desiring therefore to present
62myself to your Magnificence with some testimony of my devotion towards you, I have not found among my possessions
63anything which I hold more dear than, or value so much as, the knowledge of the actions of great men, acquired by long
64experience in contemporary affairs, and a continual study of antiquity; which, having reflected upon it with great and
65prolonged diligence, I now send, digested into a little volume, to your Magnificence. And although I may consider this
66work unworthy of your countenance, nevertheless I trust much to your benignity that it may be acceptable, seeing that it
67is not possible for me to make a better gift than to offer you the opportunity of understanding in the shortest time all
68that I have learnt in so many years, and with so many troubles and dangers; which work I have not embellished with
69swelling or magnificent words, nor stuffed with rounded periods, nor with any extrinsic allurements or adornments
70whatever, with which so many are accustomed to embellish their works; for I have wished either that no honour should be
71given it, or else that the truth of the matter and the weightiness of the theme shall make it acceptable. Nor do I hold
72with those who regard it as a presumption if a man of low and humble condition dare to discuss and settle the concerns
73of princes; because, just as those who draw landscapes place themselves below in the plain to contemplate the nature of
74the mountains and of lofty places, and in order to contemplate the plains place themselves upon high mountains, even so
75to understand the nature of the people it needs to be a prince, and to understand that of princes it needs to be of the
76people. Take then, your Magnificence, this little gift in the spirit in which I send it; wherein, if it be diligently
77read and considered by you, you will learn my extreme desire that you should attain that greatness which fortune and
78your other attributes promise. And if your Magnificence from the summit of your greatness will sometimes turn your eyes
79to these lower regions, you will see how unmeritedly I suffer a great and continued malignity of fortune. THE PRINCE HOW
80MANY KINDS OF PRINCIPALITIES THERE ARE, AND BY WHAT MEANS THEY ARE ACQUIRED All states, all powers, that have held and
81hold rule over men have been and are either republics or principalities. Principalities are either hereditary, in which
82the family has been long established; or they are new. The new are either entirely new, as was Milan to Francesco
83Sforza, or they are, as it were, members annexed to the hereditary state of the prince who has acquired them, as was the
84kingdom of Naples to that of the King of Spain. Such dominions thus acquired are either accustomed to live under a
85prince, or to live in freedom; and are acquired either by the arms of the prince himself, or of others, or else by
86fortune or by ability.
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