Machiavelli stated that it would be best to be both loved and feared.

Bolingbroke seems to be a leader coming into power at a time England is in turmoil, and follows closely the formula stated by Machiavelli.

On the topic of rhetoric Machiavelli, in his introduction, stated that “ I have not embellished or crammed this book with rounded periods or big, impressive words, or with any blandishment or superfluous decoration of the kind which many are in the habit of using to describe or adorn what they have produced ”.

Machiavelli recommended that leaders use fear — but not hatred — to maintain control.

Thucydides, Hobbes and Machiavelli are together considered the founding fathers of political realism, according to which state policy must primarily or solely focus on the need to maintain military and economic power rather than on ideals or ethics.

According to Machiavelli, these are relatively easy to maintain, once founded.

Machiavelli focused on the consistency and clear oratory of the magistrates, and argued that with no clear and consistent rationale for rule, it was inordinately difficult to maintain it.

Following an interpretation of power similar to that of Machiavelli, Foucault defines power as immaterial, as a " certain type of relation between individuals " that has to do with complex strategic social positions that relate to the subject's ability to control its environment and influence those around itself.

Niccolò Machiavelli cites Cesare's dependence on the good will of the Papacy, under the control of his father, to be the principal weakness of his rule.

Famously, Machiavelli argued that virtue and prudence can help a man control more of his future, in the place of allowing fortune to do so.

Machiavelli argues that fortune is only the judge of half of our actions and that we have control over the other half with " sweat ", prudence and virtue.

Agathocles was cited as from the lowest, most abject condition of life and as an example of “ those who by their crimes come to be princes ” in Chapter VIII of Niccolò Machiavelli ’ s treatise on politics, The Prince ( 1513 ).

Machiavelli goes on to reason that Agathocles ' success, in contrast to other criminal tyrants, was due to his ability to mitigate his crimes by limiting them to those that " are applied at one blow and are necessary to one's security, and that are not persisted in afterwards unless they can be turned to the advantage of the subjects ".

In The Prince, Machiavelli uses Borgia as an example to elucidate the dangers of acquiring a principality by virtue of another.

Machiavelli attributes two episodes to Cesare Borgia that were at least partially executed by his father: the method by which the Romagna was pacified, which Machiavelli describes in chapter VII of The Prince, and the assassination of his captains on New Year's Eve of 1503 in Senigallia.

* The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli

Furthermore, it has been established that a substantial portion of it was taken, without citation, from a 1864 satire on Napoleon III by one Maurice Joly ( his French language work, The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu )-so that it also constitutes plagiarism.

Commissioned by the Medici, Machiavelli also wrote the Florentine Histories, the history of the city.

* Niccolò Machiavelli and other Florentines preferred the version spoken by ordinary people in their own times.

* Il Principe ( 1974 ) ( text by Niccolò Machiavelli ) for 2 mixed choruses, 8 winds, 3 horns, tuba, bass guitar, piano

Believing that people were motivated by self-interest, Niccolò Machiavelli wrote The Prince in 1513 as advice for the city of Florence, Italy.

The Machiavelli family are believed to be descended from the old marquesses of Tuscany and to have produced thirteen Florentine Gonfalonieres of Justice, one of the offices of a group of nine citizens selected by drawing lots every two months, who formed the government, or Signoria.

Machiavelli was deprived of office in 1512 by the Medici.

Scholars often note that Machiavelli glorifies instrumentality in statebuilding-an approach embodied by the saying that " the ends justify the means.

In contrast with Plato and Aristotle, Machiavelli insisted that an imaginary ideal society is not a model that a prince should orient himself by.

Machiavelli was critical of catholic political thinking and may have been influenced by Averroism.

Aimed-for things which the Socratics argued would tend to happen by nature, Machiavelli said would happen by chance.

Strauss argued that Machiavelli may have seen himself as influenced by some ideas from classical materialists such as Democritus, Epicurus and Lucretius.

Strauss argued that Machiavelli may indeed have been influenced by pre-Socratic philosophers, but he felt it was a new combination :-

Strauss concludes his 1958 Thoughts on Machiavelli by proposing that this promotion of progress leads directly to the modern arms race.

He estimated that these sects last from 1666 to 3000 years each time, which, as pointed out by Leo Strauss, would mean that Christianity became due to start finishing about 150 years after Machiavelli.

Other utilitarian-type views include the claims that the end of action is survival and growth, as in evolutionary ethics ( the 19th-century English philosopher Herbert Spencer ); the experience of power, as in despotism ( the 16th-century Italian political philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli and the 19th-century German Friedrich Nietzsche ); satisfaction and adjustment, as in pragmatism ( 20th-century American philosophers Ralph Barton Perry and John Dewey ); and freedom, as in existentialism ( the 20th-century French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre ).

In political and historical writing Niccolò Machiavelli and his friend Francesco Guicciardini initiated a new realistic style of writing.

A second individual of unusually acute insight was Niccolò Machiavelli, whose prescriptions for Florence's regeneration under strong leadership have often been seen as a legitimization of political expediency and even malpractice.

In other words, Machiavelli was a sort of political thinker, perhaps most renowned for his political handbook titled, The Prince, which is about ruling and the exercise of power.

Machiavelli then retired to his estate at Sant ' Andrea in Percussina ( near San Casciano in Val di Pesa ), and devoted himself to study and to the writing of the political treatises that earned his intellectual place in the development of political philosophy and political conduct.

Despairing of the opportunity to remain directly involved in political matters, after a time Machiavelli began to participate in intellectual groups in Florence and wrote several plays that ( unlike his works on political theory ) were both popular and widely known in his lifetime.

As a political scientist, Machiavelli emphasizes the occasional need for the methodical exercise of brute force, deceit, and so on.

Machiavelli has become infamous for such political advice, ensuring that he would be remembered in history through the adjective, " Machiavellian.

Besides being a statesman and political scientist, Machiavelli also translated classical works, and was a dramaturge ( Clizia, Mandragola ), a poet ( Sonetti, Canzoni, Ottave, Canti carnascialeschi ), and a novelist ( Belfagor arcidiavolo ).

Strauss however sees this also as a sign of major innovation in Machiavelli, because classical materialists did not share the Socratic regard for political life, while Machiavelli clearly did.

Leo Strauss, an American political philosopher, declared himself more inclined toward the traditional view that Machiavelli was self-consciously a " teacher of evil ," ( even if he was not himself evil ) since he counsels the princes to avoid the values of justice, mercy, temperance, wisdom, and love of their people in preference to the use of cruelty, violence, fear, and deception.

Italian anti-fascist philosopher Benedetto Croce ( 1925 ) concludes Machiavelli is simply a " realist " or " pragmatist " who accurately states that moral values in reality do not greatly affect the decisions that political leaders make.

German philosopher Ernst Cassirer ( 1946 ) held that Machiavelli simply adopts the stance of a political scientist — a Galileo of politics — in distinguishing between the " facts " of political life and the " values " of moral judgment.

Machiavelli is most famous for a short political treatise, The Prince, written in 1513 but not published until 1532, five years after his death.

These authors tended to cite Tacitus as their source for realist political advice, rather than Machiavelli, and this pretense came to be known as " Tacitism ".

Scholars have argued that Machiavelli was a major indirect and direct influence upon the political thinking of the Founding Fathers of the United States.

However, the Founding Father who perhaps most studied and valued Machiavelli as a political philosopher was John Adams, who profusely commented on the Italian's thought in his work, A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America.