Yet the way men live is so far removed from the way they ought to live that anyone who abandons what is for what should be pursues his downfall rather than his preservation"(Machiavelli, ). .
To Machiavelli, a successful ruler is one who can impress people, regardless of what he really is inside. He says that "A Prince, therefore, need not necessarily have all (good) qualities but should certainly appear to" (Machiavelli, 55). To him, a good ruler is one that is seen as "merciful, faithful, humane, frank and religious" so long as it does not interfere with his best interest. He sees no purpose in restraining and controlling oneself for the society because the society will not prosper if the ruler does not control himself. Ruthlessness, maliciousness, and deviousness are all hailed as being acceptable, in fact encouraged, as means of securing positions of power. Through his prioritizing, "Machiavelli does not seem to be as concerned with the society and the individual as the previous philosophers in history had been" (L&HR, Davey). For example, "John Locke and Thomas Hobbes wrote about the good and evil tendencies, respectively, of society (L&HR, Davey)." Rather, he sees power as the one and only goal in life regardless of the individual or the state, which parallels our modern Government today. .
Again, though, he was a reflection of his times. "The men of the Renaissance era wanted many things--money, power, enjoyment in life--regardless of the moral cost" (L&HR, Davey). Others would argue that these embellishments either meant nothing or would not occur without restraining the desires of both one's self and one's state. One needs balance of everything in order to reach the ideals of perfection, but Machiavelli would argue that perfection is not real and so is not worth striving for. Instead, one must live for one self. He makes the generalization of men that "they are ungrateful, fickle, dissembling, anxious to flee danger, and covetous of gain.
