Book One — The Founding and Ordering of a Free State

Niccolò Machiavelli to Zanobi Buondelmonti and Cosimo Rucellai, Greetings

I send you a gift which, if it does not answer to the obligations I have to you, is without doubt the greatest that Niccolò Machiavelli has been able to send you. For in it I have expressed everything I know and have learned through a long practice and a continual reading of the things of the world. And since neither you nor anyone else can want more from me than this, you cannot complain if I have not given you more.

In this I seem to have departed from the common custom of those who write, who always dedicate their works to some prince, and, blinded by ambition and avarice, praise him for all the virtuous qualities when they should blame him for every shameful part. So, not to fall into this error, I have chosen not those who are princes, but those who, for their infinite good qualities, deserve to be; not those who could load me with ranks, honours and riches, but those who, though unable, would wish to. For men, to judge rightly, should esteem those who are liberal, not those who can be; and those who know how to govern a kingdom, not those who can govern one without knowing how. Writers praise Hiero of Syracuse more when he was a private man than Perseus of Macedon when he was king; for Hiero lacked nothing to be a prince but the principality, and Perseus had nothing of a king but the kingdom.

Enjoy, then, this good or this evil which you yourselves have wanted; and if you should fall into the error of finding these opinions of mine pleasing, I will not fail to continue with the rest of the history, as I promised you at the beginning. Farewell.

Preface

Although, because of the envious nature of men, it has always been no less dangerous to find new modes and orders than to seek unknown waters and lands — since men are more ready to blame than to praise the actions of others — nonetheless, driven by the natural desire I have always had to work without any regard for those things I believe bring common benefit to everyone, I have decided to enter upon a path which, not having yet been trodden by anyone, may bring me trouble and difficulty, but may also bring me reward from those who consider with kindness the end of these labours of mine.

When I consider how much honour is given to antiquity, and how many times — to pass over countless other examples — a fragment of an ancient statue has been bought at a high price to have it near oneself, to honour one's house with it and to have it imitated by those who delight in that art; and how these then strive with every effort to copy it in all their works; and when I see, on the other side, that the most virtuous deeds that histories show us, done by ancient kingdoms and republics, by kings, captains, citizens and lawgivers who laboured for their country, are rather admired than imitated — indeed are so avoided by everyone in every smallest thing that no sign of that ancient virtù remains to us — I cannot help marvelling and grieving at the same time.

And all the more so when I see that in the civil disputes that arise among citizens, or in the illnesses that men fall into, they always run to the judgments and remedies that the ancients gave. For civil law is nothing but the opinions given by the ancient jurists, and medicine is nothing but the experiments made by the ancient physicians. Nonetheless, in ordering republics, maintaining states, governing kingdoms, ordering the militia and conducting war, judging subjects and increasing an empire, there is found neither prince nor republic that turns to the examples of the ancients.

This arises, I believe, not so much from the weakness into which the present religion has brought the world, or from the evil that an ambitious idleness has done to many Christian provinces and cities, as from not having a true knowledge of histories — from not drawing from them, in reading them, the sense, nor tasting the flavour they have in themselves. So the countless people who read them take pleasure in hearing the variety of events they contain, without ever thinking of imitating them, judging imitation not only difficult but impossible: as if the heavens, the sun, the elements and men had changed in their motion, order and power from what they were in ancient times.

Wishing, then, to draw men from this error, I have judged it necessary to write, on all those books of Titus Livy that the malice of time has not taken from us, what I judge necessary for a greater understanding of them by comparing ancient and modern things, so that those who read these explanations of mine may more easily draw from them the usefulness for which one ought to seek the knowledge of histories.

I.1. What the beginnings of all cities have been, and what Rome's were

Cities are built either by natives of the place or by foreigners. Men build them for safety, or for convenience, or under compulsion. And since men act either by necessity or by choice, and there is greater virtù where choice has less part, one might think it better to build in barren places, where men, forced to be industrious and less taken with idleness, live more united. This choice would be wise if men were content to live on their own and did not seek to rule others. But since men cannot make themselves secure except by power, it is necessary to build in the most fertile places, and then to order, by laws, that the necessity which the site does not provide shall be imposed — as the Egyptians did, who, living in a most pleasant land, filled their men with the hardest exercises. So it was with Rome: whether it was founded by Aeneas or by Romulus, it had a free beginning, and its laws imposed the necessity that the fertility of the site would have taken away.

I.2. How many kinds of republics there are, and which was the Roman

Those who have written about republics say there are three kinds of government — principality, aristocracy and popular rule — and that each easily turns into its corruption: principality into tyranny, aristocracy into the rule of a few, and popular rule into licence. Chance gave birth to these forms among men. At first they lived scattered like beasts; then, as they multiplied, they gathered together and chose the strongest and bravest as their head. Then, when they saw that ingratitude and injury were hateful, they made laws, and began to choose not the strongest but the most prudent and just. When the princes became hereditary and degenerated, tyranny began; the powerful overthrew it and ruled as a few, for the common good at first; their sons, forgetting, ruled for themselves; the people overthrew them and ruled themselves; and in time this too fell into licence, so that, to escape it, they returned to a prince. This is the circle through which all republics have turned and turn. But rarely do they return to the same governments, because hardly any republic can live so long as to pass through these changes many times without being ruined; it falls rather under some neighbour better ordered than itself.

So I say that all these forms are harmful — the three good ones because they are short-lived, the three bad ones because of their malignity. Prudent lawgivers, knowing this, chose a form that shared in all three, judging it steadier and firmer, since each keeps watch on the others. Lycurgus gave Sparta such laws at one stroke, and it lasted more than eight hundred years. Solon gave Athens only popular rule, and it lasted a short time. Rome had no Lycurgus to order it at the beginning; yet so many accidents arose from the disunion between the plebs and the Senate that chance did what a lawgiver had not done. Kings, consuls, senate and tribunes came together, and a perfect republic was made.

I.3. What events caused the creation of the tribunes in Rome, which made the republic more perfect

As all who reason about civil life show, and as every history is full of examples, whoever orders a republic and makes laws in it must presuppose that all men are bad, and that they will use the malignity of their spirit whenever they have a free chance. When some malignity hides for a time, it comes from a hidden cause that has not yet been seen; but time, which they call the father of all truth, uncovers it. It seemed in Rome, after the Tarquins were driven out, that there was the greatest union between plebs and Senate, and that the nobles had put aside their pride. This deception was hidden while the Tarquins lived; when they were dead, the nobles began to spit at the plebs all the venom they had kept in their breasts. This shows what I said above: men never do anything good except by necessity. Where there is enough freedom of choice and licence, everything is at once filled with confusion and disorder. So it is said that hunger and poverty make men industrious, and laws make them good. Out of this insolence came the tribunes, to stand between the plebs and the Senate.

I.4. That the disunion of the plebs and the Roman Senate made that republic free and powerful

I do not want to leave unsaid something about the tumults that took place in Rome between the death of the Tarquins and the creation of the tribunes. Many say Rome was a tumultuous republic, full of such confusion that if good fortune and military virtù had not made up for its defects, it would have been inferior to every other republic. I say that those who condemn the tumults between the nobles and the plebs blame the very thing that was the first cause of keeping Rome free, and look more at the noises and cries that arose from these tumults than at the good effects they produced. They do not consider that in every republic there are two different humours, that of the people and that of the great, and that all the laws made in favour of liberty arise from their disunion.

From the Tarquins to the Gracchi, more than three hundred years, the tumults of Rome rarely produced exile and very rarely blood. One cannot, therefore, judge these tumults harmful, nor such a republic divided, which in so long a time sent no more than eight or ten citizens into exile, killed very few, and fined few. Nor can one in any way call disordered a republic where there are so many examples of virtù, for good examples arise from good education, good education from good laws, and good laws from those tumults that many inconsiderately condemn. Every city must have its ways by which the people can vent their ambition, especially cities that want to use the people in important matters.

I.5. Where the guard of liberty is more securely placed, in the people or in the great

Among the most necessary things ordered by those who have founded a republic prudently is a guard of liberty. One must consider the purpose of the one and of the other: one will see in the great a great desire to dominate, and in the people only the desire not to be dominated, and consequently a greater will to live free. So it is reasonable to put the guard of liberty in the hands of the people, who, having less hope of seizing it, will take more care of it. Sparta and Venice put it in the hands of the nobles, and lived long; Rome put it in the hands of the plebs. If one considers which is better, one must look at whether one wishes to make an empire, as Rome did, or to stay within limits.

I.6. Whether a state could have been ordered in Rome that would have removed the enmities between the people and the Senate

If Rome had wanted to remove the causes of its tumults, it would also have removed the causes of its growth. For if Rome had wanted to be quiet, it would have had to do one of two things: not use the plebs in war, as the Venetians did, or not open the way to foreigners, as the Spartans did. But since all human things are in motion and cannot stand still, they must either rise or fall; and to many things that reason does not lead you to, necessity leads you. So when a republic ordered to maintain itself without expanding is forced by necessity to expand, its foundations give way. I believe, then, that one must follow the Roman order and not that of other republics, since it is impossible to find a middle way, and bear the enmities that arise between people and Senate as an inconvenience necessary to arrive at Roman greatness.

I.7. How necessary accusations are in a republic to maintain liberty

Those set in a city to guard its liberty can be given no more useful authority than the power to accuse citizens before the people or some magistrate when they sin against the free state. This has two effects: citizens do not attempt anything against the state for fear of being accused, and the humours that grow in cities against this or that citizen have a lawful way to vent themselves. When they have no ordinary way, they turn to extraordinary ones that ruin the whole republic. Coriolanus, hated by the plebs, would have been killed in a riot if the tribunes had not summoned him to defend himself; and that way the anger of the plebs had an outlet in the laws. In our own Florence, when Francesco Valori was hated as one who wished to make himself prince, there was no way to accuse him; so his enemies took up arms, and it ended in his death and much harm to the city.

I.9. That it is necessary to be alone to order a republic anew, or to reform it entirely

Many will perhaps judge it a bad example that a founder of a civil way of life, like Romulus, should first have killed his brother and then consented to the death of Titus Tatius, his partner in the kingdom. But this is a general rule: rarely or never is any republic or kingdom well ordered from the beginning, or entirely reformed, unless it is ordered by one man alone. So a prudent founder, who intends to help not himself but the common good, not his own heirs but his common fatherland, should seek to have authority alone. No wise mind will ever reproach anyone for an extraordinary action used to order a kingdom or establish a republic. It is fitting that, though the act accuses him, the result excuses him; and when the result is good, as with Romulus, it will always excuse him. For he who is violent to destroy should be blamed, not he who is violent to mend. That Romulus deserved excuse is shown by his having at once ordered a senate with which to take counsel; and by the fact that, when the Tarquins were later driven out, the Romans changed nothing of his orders except putting two yearly consuls in place of a king for life.

I.10. As much as the founders of a republic or a kingdom are praiseworthy, so much are those of a tyranny worthy of blame

Of all men who are praised, the most praised are those who have been heads and founders of religions. Next are those who have founded republics or kingdoms. After these are celebrated those who, at the head of armies, have extended their own kingdom or their country's. To these are added men of letters. On the contrary, those are infamous and detestable who destroy religions, scatter kingdoms and republics, and are enemies of virtue, of letters and of every other art that brings usefulness and honour to the human race — that is, the impious, the violent, the ignorant, the idle, the base.

And let no one be deceived by the glory of Caesar, hearing him celebrated by writers; for those who praise him are corrupted by his fortune and frightened by the length of the empire which, ruling under his name, did not allow writers to speak freely of him. But whoever wants to know what free writers would say of him, let him see what they say of Catiline. Let a prince consider the times from Nerva to Marcus: he will see a secure prince among secure citizens, the world full of peace and justice, the Senate with its authority. And then let him consider the other emperors: he will see Rome burned, the Capitol destroyed by its own citizens, the ancient temples deserted, the cities full of adulteries, the sea full of exiles and the rocks full of blood. And then he will know very well how much Rome, Italy and the world owe to Caesar.

I.11–12. Of the religion of the Romans; and how much it matters to take account of religion, and how Italy, lacking it through the Roman Church, has been ruined

Though Rome had Romulus as its first founder, the heavens, judging that his orders were not enough for so great an empire, inspired the Senate to choose Numa Pompilius as his successor. Numa, finding a very ferocious people and wishing to bring them to civil obedience by the arts of peace, turned to religion as a thing altogether necessary to maintain a civilisation. He pretended to have meetings with a nymph who advised him what to counsel the people. And whoever considers Roman history will see how much religion served to command armies, to give heart to the plebs, to keep men good and to make the wicked ashamed. For where there is fear of God, everything is easily ordered; and where there is not, it must be held together by fear of a prince, which lasts only as long as his life. Nor did the people of Florence think themselves either ignorant or coarse, yet Brother Girolamo Savonarola persuaded them that he spoke with God.

Princes and republics that want to keep themselves uncorrupted must above all keep uncorrupted the ceremonies of their religion. And if such religion had been kept by the princes of the Christian republic as its founder ordained it, the Christian states and republics would be more united and much happier than they are. Nor can one find a greater sign of its decline than to see that the peoples closest to the Roman Church, the head of our religion, have less religion. Whoever considered its foundations, and saw how much present practice differs from them, would judge that without doubt its ruin or its scourge is near.

We Italians, then, have this first debt to the Church and to the priests: that we have become without religion and wicked. But we have a still greater one, which is the second cause of our ruin: that the Church has kept and keeps this province divided. For no province was ever united or happy unless it all came under the obedience of one republic or one prince, as happened to France and Spain. The Church, having its seat here and holding temporal power, has been neither so powerful nor of such virtù that it could seize the whole of Italy, nor so weak that, fearing to lose its temporal dominion, it could not call in someone powerful to defend it against whoever in Italy had become too powerful. Whoever wanted to see the truth of this by certain experience would need to have the power to send the Roman court, with the authority it has in Italy, to live in the lands of the Swiss, who today are the only peoples who live, in religion and in military orders, as the ancients did; and he would see that in a little time the wicked customs of that court would make more disorder in that country than any other accident that could ever arise there.

I.16. A people accustomed to living under a prince, if by some accident it becomes free, maintains its freedom with difficulty

Such a people is like a brute animal which, though of a ferocious and wild nature, has always been fed in prison and in servitude; which, if it is then let loose in the fields by chance, not being used to feeding itself or knowing the places where it may take refuge, becomes the prey of the first who seeks to chain it again. And a new free state has enemies and no partisans: enemies in all those who profited from the tyranny, and no partisans, because a free life gives honours and rewards only for certain honest causes, and when a man has what seems to him his due, he does not feel himself obliged to anyone.

I.17–18. A corrupt people that comes to freedom can maintain itself free only with the greatest difficulty; and how a free state may be kept in corrupt cities

Rome, when the Tarquins were driven out, could at once take and keep its freedom; but after the death of Caesar, Caligula and Nero, it could not, because the people had become corrupt. Where the matter is not corrupt, tumults and other troubles do no harm; where it is corrupt, well-ordered laws do no good, unless they are set in motion by one man of such extreme force that he makes them observed until the matter becomes good. For just as good customs need laws to maintain themselves, so laws need good customs to be observed. And the orders that were good when a city was born are no longer good when its citizens have become wicked.

I.21. How much a prince or a republic that lacks its own arms deserves blame

Present princes and modern republics that lack their own soldiers for defence and offence should be ashamed of themselves, and think, by the example of Tullus Hostilius, that this defect is not for lack of men fit for war, but through their own fault, that they have not known how to make their men soldiers. When Tullus became king, Rome had been at peace for forty years and had no soldiers who had seen war; yet in a short time he made excellent soldiers of them. It is truer than any other truth that if there are no soldiers where there are men, it is the fault of the prince and of nothing else.

I.25–26. Whoever wishes to reform an old state in a free city should keep at least the shadow of the ancient modes; and a new prince, in a city or province he has taken, must make everything new

Whoever wants to reform the state of a city so that it is accepted and can maintain itself to everyone's satisfaction must keep at least the shadow of the ancient modes, so that the people do not seem to have changed their order even if the new orders are in fact entirely different from the past. For men in general feed on what seems as much as on what is. So the Romans, having done away with the kings, kept a "king of sacrifices" so that the people should not miss the old name.

But whoever becomes prince of a city or state, especially if his foundations are weak, has no better remedy for keeping it, if he does not want to turn to a civil life in the form of a kingdom or a republic, than to make everything new in that state: to make new governments with new names, new authorities, new men; to make the rich poor and the poor rich, as David did when he became king — "he has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty" — and to build new cities, destroy the old, move the inhabitants from one place to another, as Philip of Macedon did, who moved men from province to province as shepherds move their flocks. These modes are very cruel, and enemies of every way of life, not only Christian but human; and any man should avoid them, and want to live as a private man rather than as a king with so much ruin of men. Nonetheless, whoever does not want to take this first way of the good must, if he wants to maintain himself, enter into this evil. But men take certain middle ways, which are most harmful, for they do not know how to be either altogether good or altogether bad.

I.27. Very rarely do men know how to be altogether wicked or altogether good

Pope Julius II, going to Bologna in 1505 to drive out the Bentivoglio, came to Perugia to drive out Giovampagolo Baglioni, its tyrant; and with his usual impetuosity he entered the city unarmed, with only his guard, though Giovampagolo was inside with a large force. The prudent men who were with the Pope noted his rashness and Giovampagolo's cowardice; nor could they understand why he had not, to his perpetual fame, crushed his enemy at one stroke and enriched himself with the booty, since the Pope had with him all the cardinals with their treasures. Nor can it be believed that he held back from goodness or conscience, for no respect for piety could restrain the breast of a wicked man who kept his sister as his own and had killed his cousins and nephews to reign. So it was concluded that men do not know how to be honourably wicked or perfectly good; and when a wickedness has in itself some greatness or is generous in some part, they do not know how to enter into it. Giovampagolo, who did not mind being incestuous and a public parricide, did not know how, or rather did not dare, to do a deed in which everyone would have admired his courage, and which would have left an eternal memory of him.

I.29. Which is more ungrateful, a people or a prince

The vice of ingratitude arises from avarice or from suspicion. A prince is naturally more ungrateful than a people, because he more naturally fears the glory of a captain who has won him a great victory. And republics, being free and less suspicious, are less ungrateful; and of all republics, Rome, for the reasons given, was the least ungrateful.

I.34. The authority of the dictator did good and not harm to the Roman republic

Some have condemned the Romans for the dictatorship, as if it were the cause of the tyranny of Caesar. But it was not the name or the rank of dictator that made Rome a slave, but the authority that citizens took for themselves through the length of their commands. For the dictator was made for a limited time and only to deal with the matter for which he was created; he could not change the old orders of the city. Among the Roman orders, this one deserves to be considered and numbered among the most important. Republics which, in urgent dangers, have no recourse to a dictator or a similar authority will always be ruined in grave accidents.

I.37. What troubles the agrarian law caused in Rome

The ancient writers say that men grieve in evil and grow weary of good, and both passions produce the same effects. For whenever men are not forced to fight by necessity, they fight by ambition, which is so powerful in human breasts that, however high they climb, it never leaves them. Nature has created men so that they can desire everything and cannot attain everything; so, the desire being always greater than the power to acquire, there follows discontent with what they possess. From this comes the variation of their fortune; for some desiring to have more, and others fearing to lose what they have, they come to enmities and to war.

I.39. In different peoples the same accidents are often seen

Whoever considers present and ancient things easily knows that in all cities and all peoples there are the same desires and the same humours, and there always have been. So it is easy, for whoever examines past things diligently, to foresee future things in every republic and to apply the remedies the ancients used, or, finding none used, to think of new ones from the likeness of the accidents. But because these considerations are neglected, or not understood by those who read, or, if understood, not known to those who govern, the same scandals follow in every time.

I.46. Men climb from one ambition to another; first they seek not to be offended, then to offend others

The plebs wanted to defend themselves against the nobility, and, having won the tribunes, they began to want more. For men, seeking not to fear, begin to make others fear; and the injury they drive away from themselves they lay on others, as if it were necessary either to offend or to be offended.

I.47. Men, though they deceive themselves in generalities, do not deceive themselves in particulars

When the Capuans hated their senate, Pacuvius Calavius shut the senators in the palace and told the people they could punish them, but must first choose a better man to put in each one's place. When the first name was read and the people shouted for his death, Pacuvius asked them to name a replacement; and as each name was proposed, the people found fault with it. In the end they kept the old senate, seeing that it was easier to condemn in general than to find better men in particular. So when a people, in general, think a thing should be done, if one makes them descend to particulars, they often see their error.

I.55. How easily things are conducted in a city where the multitude is not corrupt; and where there is equality, a principality cannot be made, and where there is not, a republic cannot be made

In those provinces where there are many gentlemen — I call gentlemen those who live idly on the abundant revenues of their possessions, without any care for cultivating them or any other labour necessary to live, and still more those who have castles and subjects who obey them — no republic or political life has ever arisen, because such men are altogether hostile to every civil way of life. The Kingdom of Naples, the lands of Rome, Romagna and Lombardy are full of them; so there has never been a republic there. Tuscany, on the contrary, has had so few that in a small space it has had three republics, Florence, Siena and Lucca. And the free cities of Germany live free for no other reason than that there is great equality among them.

So whoever wants to make a republic where there are many gentlemen cannot do it unless he first eliminates them all; and whoever wants to make a kingdom or principality where there is great equality cannot do it unless he draws from that equality many ambitious and restless spirits and makes them gentlemen in fact and not in name.

I.58. The multitude is wiser and more constant than a prince

Nothing is more vain and more inconstant than the multitude, says our Titus Livy, as do all the other historians. But I say that the defect for which writers blame the multitude can be charged against all men individually, and especially against princes. For anyone not regulated by the laws would make the same errors as an unrestrained multitude. A people that commands and is well ordered will be stable, prudent and grateful, no less than a prince, or more than a prince, even if he is considered wise. As for prudence and stability, I say that a people is more prudent, more stable, and of better judgment than a prince. And not without reason is the voice of a people likened to that of God; for one sees that a general opinion makes marvellous predictions, so that it seems by some hidden virtue to foresee its own ill and its own good. As for judging things, when a people hears two orators of equal virtù pulling in different directions, very rarely does it fail to take the better opinion. And if princes are superior to peoples in ordering laws, forming civil lives, and ordering new statutes and orders, peoples are so much superior in maintaining things ordered that they add without doubt to the glory of those who ordered them.