...against my will, my fate,
A throne unsettled, and an infant state,
Bid me defend my realms with all my pow'rs, And guard with these severities my … - Niccolò Machiavelli
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...against my will, my fate, A throne unsettled, and an infant state, Bid me defend my realms with all my pow'rs, And guard with these severities my shores.
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About
Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli (3 May 1469 – 21 June 1527) was an Italian political philosopher, historian, musician, poet, and romantic comedic playwright. Machiavelli was also a key figure in realist political theory, crucial to European statecraft during the Renaissance.
Biography information from
Wikiquote·
Portrait adapted from
Wikimedia Commons, Santi di Tito (Public domain / CC0)
Also Known As
Native Name:
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
Alternative Names:
Nicolas Machiavel
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Machiavel
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Niccolo di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
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Niccolo Machiavelli
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Nicolò Machiavelli
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Nicolo Machiavelli
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Machiavelli
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N. Machiavelli
It is of the greatest important in this world that a man should know himself, and the measure of his own strength and means; and he who knows that he has not a genius for fighting must learn how to govern by the arts of peace.
Thus it will always happen that he who is not your friend will demand your neutrality, whilst he who is your friend will entreat you to declare yourself with arms.
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When evening comes, I return home and enter my study; on the threshold I take off my workday clothes, covered with mud and dirt, and put on the garments of court and palace. Fitted out appropriately, I step inside the venerable courts of the ancients, where, solicitously received by them, I nourish myself on that food that alone is mine and for which I was born; where I am unashamed to converse with them and to question them about the motives for their actions, and they, out of their human kindness, answer me. And for four hours at a time I feel no boredom, I forget all my troubles, I do not dread poverty, and I am not terrified by death. I absorb myself into them completely.
