Niccolo Machiavelli’s “The Prince”, written in 1513, was his guide and textbook on how to be a Prince and the process of how
principalities emerge. First he begins with what kind of principalities there are, how they are formed, if they were hereditary, earned, or fought for.Then he delineates how a Prince should be personally; the most successful attributes of a Prince and how he should
behave and what the public should
think or believe about him. “The Prince”
describes how to gain and maintain
power in
politics, and provides an excellent snapshot on life and thought in Renaissance Florence. The
book has been misquoted many times, but what Machiavelli really wrote seems less ruthless and more reasonable. The Medici family was ruling Florence at the time of Machiavelli’s “The Prince”, and one can speculate they took his advice. I think “The Prince” describes the world of men and power very well, but this was before feminism. Women in power behave differently so in some cases this book is not relevant. But overall, Machiavelli’s understanding of human nature and the controlling of the masses is astute.
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