Machiavelli — "It is not reason but necessity that makes men humble."
It is not reason but necessity that makes men humble.
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More from Machiavelli
"A man who is used to acting in one way, cannot change; because he cannot, he is ruined."
"To be feared is much safer than to be loved."
"No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution."
"No state is ever well established unless it has a good army."
"For it can be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, fickle, feigners and dissemblers, shirkers of dangers, eager for gain."
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.