If they lacked the opportunity, the strength of their sprit would have been sapped; if they had lacked ability, the opportunity would have been waste… - Niccolò Machiavelli

Without an opportunity, their abilities would have been wasted, and without their abilities, the opportunity would have arisen in vain.

It is easier for the prince to make friends of those men who were contented under the former government, and are therefore his enemies, than of those who, being discontented with it, were favourable to him and encouraged him to seize it.

For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new.

Just as artists who draw landscapes get down in the valley to study the mountains and go up to the mountains to look down on the valley, so one has to be a prince to get to know the character of a people and a man of the people to know the character of a prince.