be considered intolerable, but however, must be done in order to ensure an effective rule. He begins by discussing Hereditary states. Hereditary states are states that are ruled for many years by an already established family. During his discussion of these types of states, he concludes that it is easier for a prince to prosper in this setting as opposed to a principality.

He continues that when a prince comes to be in a hereditary state he only had to maintain previous habits and simply make them apply to present times, which is easy since his subjects are already loyal to the existing family. He then begins to explain the down side princes face while trying to maintain rule over principalities and so forth. Most of his instructions are self explanatory and he writes them as if they are common knowledge. His instructions consist of, usings ones own troops, siding with the general people more than the nobl

Protecting oneself from invasion and foreign control is a major political concern of Machiavelli’s here, which is not immoral in itself. Although many of his theories do appear to be deceitful and cruel, such as when in Chapter 17 he argues that it is better for a prince to be severe when punishing people rather than merciful. Severity through death sentences affects only a few, but it deters crimes which affects many. However, in the end it actually is for the betterment of the majority, because by deterring crimes that affect many, it saves a bigger number of people from loss or hurt. He also gives examples of rulers who have either succeeded in the world of politics, or succumbed to it because of their inexperience, to back up his points. This can be seen throughout the book, and make his points appear more valid and powerful.

This statement as well as others shows that throughout the book, Machiavelli makes a lot of assumptions about what people will do as oppose to what they might do. I feel that a large area of his writing is in error because human nature cannot be generalized. Of course one can speculate on what majorities will or will not do but in the end there will be a few to step up and break molds. Then again, he wrote hi book in a time where people had less options than what exist today. With these limitations it might be possible for one to predict the actions of people.

In Machiavelli’s defense, he does explain that the job of a prince isn’t for everyone. His prince must be a combination of two beast a fox and a lion. “A prince, therefore, being compelled knowingly to adopt the beast, ought to choose the fox and the lion; because the lion cannot defend himself against snares and the fox cannot defend himself against wolves. Therefore, it is necessary to be a fox to discover the snares and a lion to terrify the wolves. Those who rely simply on the lion do not understand what they are about.” In this statement, Machiavelli is trying to say that when a prince is dealing with people he must break his promises from time to time because some promises might leave him vulnerable. He should also break his promises if the situation makes them become irrelevant. He later concludes that the prince should not use promises as a tool to rule with continued generalization, “But it is necessary to know well how to disguise this characteristic, and to

His ideal ruler is a mix of the many he mentions including Ferdinand of Argon, Alexander the Great, certain Roman Emperors, and Cesare Borgia . He had a strong dislike for the previous Italian princes. The fact Machiaveli has taken the time to write this book leads me to believe that Italy was in desperate times. Its faith was up in the air and a certain individual decided to express his opinions as well as concern. After examining the tone of the book I discovered that Machiavelli isn’t just simply writing his thoughts as expressed opinions but more along the lines of facts or laws. While providing possible roads that a prince can travel within each different conflict, sarcasm is heavily conveyed through the choices or roads that he views as being the wrong ones. More often than not he leaves his ideal Prince with no middle ground to travel with statements such as “Men must either be pampered or annihilated.”

Some topics in this essay:
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