Machiavelli — "For there is no other way of guarding oneself from flatterers than by letting me…"
For there is no other way of guarding oneself from flatterers than by letting men understand that to tell you the truth will not offend you.
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More from Machiavelli
"No state is ever well established unless it has a good army."
"One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived."
"It is necessary for a prince wishing to hold his own to know how to do wrong, and to make use of it or not according to necessity."
"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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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.