Machiavelli — "A prince must be a fox, to know how to avoid snares; and a lion, to terrify wolv…"
A prince must be a fox, to know how to avoid snares; and a lion, to terrify wolves.
Get This Quote & Author's Image Illustrated On:
Click any product to generate a realistic preview. Up to 3 at a time.
* Initial load can take up to 90 seconds — revising the preview in another color is nearly instant.
Kitchen
Apparel
Other
More from Machiavelli
"Men must either be caressed or annihilated; they will revenge themselves for slight wrongs, but not for great ones."
"It is necessary for a prince, if he wishes to maintain himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not use it, according to the necessity of the case."
"In the actions of men, and especially of princes, from which there is no appeal, the end justifies the means."
"Hence it is to be remarked that, in seizing a state, the usurper ought to arrange to commit all his cruelties at once, so as not to have to repeat them every day, and thus able to secure men without f…"
"He who desires to rule, must be prepared to use fraud and deceit."
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.