Machiavelli — "For it can be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, fickle, feigners …"
For it can be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, fickle, feigners and dissemblers, shirkers of dangers, eager for gain.
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More from Machiavelli
"For the nature of men is such that they are much more bound by the benefits they confer than by those they receive."
"Men are always averse to new things, and it is very hard to persuade them to change."
"Men must either be caressed or annihilated; they will revenge themselves for slight wrongs, but not for great ones."
"Politics have no relation to morals."
"It is not reason but necessity that makes men humble."
About Machiavelli (1469-1527)
Florentine diplomat and political theorist whose The Prince (written 1513) became the founding text of political realism and gave us the adjective 'Machiavellian.' Closely associated with Francesco Guicciardini (fellow Florentine political analyst and historian). For an intellectual contrast, see Erasmus of Rotterdam, Dutch humanist and The Education of a Christian Prince author (1516) — Erasmus's princely-instruction manual was published three years after Machiavelli's, for the same European audience, and is the explicit Christian-virtue alternative to Machiavellian power-realism. The cleanest 'realism vs idealism' founding pairing in modern political theory.