# 6. On Conspiracies

[In view of the abnormal length of this Discourse, insets indicating the subjects discussed have been inserted (by Fr. Walker) at the beginning of each paragraph or set of paragraphs]

Introductory

Since conspiracies are of such dangerous consequence alike to princes and to private persons, I cannot well omit to discuss their nature, for it is plain that many more princes have lost their lives and their states in this way than by open war, because it is given to but few to make open war on a prince, whereas anyone can conspire against him.56 There is, on the other hand, no enterprise in which private persons can engage, more dangerous or more rash than is this, for it is both difficult and extremely dangerous in all its stages. Whence it comes about that, though many conspiracies have been attempted, very few have attained the desired end. Hence, in order that princes may learn how to guard against these dangers, and that private persons may think twice before undertaking them and may learn, instead, to be content with life under the regime which fate has placed over them, I shall speak of conspiracies at length, omitting nothing of importance that is relevant either to a prince or to a private person. There is, in fact, a golden saying voiced by Cornelius Tacitus, who says that men have to respect the past but to submit to the present, and, while they should be desirous of having good princes, should put up with them of whatever sort they may turn out to be. And unquestionably those who act otherwise usually bring disaster both upon themselves and upon their country.

In starting to deal with this topic the first thing to be considered is against whom conspiracies are formed. It will be found that they are formed either against one’s fatherland or against a prince. I propose here to discuss both these types, for of conspiracies formed with a view to handing over a town to the enemy besieging it or conspiracies which for one reason or another resemble this, enough has been said elsewhere.

Causes

We shall deal in the first part of this discourse with conspiracies against a prince, and shall inquire first as to their causes, which are many. There is, however, one which is much more important than all the rest. This consists in the universal hatred a prince may evoke, for when a prince has aroused such universal hatred it is to be expected that there will be certain persons to whom he has given greater offence and that they will seek vengeance. This desire will be intensified by the universal ill will which they notice has been aroused against him. A prince, therefore, should avoid incurring these personal reproaches, and since what he has to do in order to avoid them has been discussed elsewhere I shall refrain from discussing it here: I mention it because, if he does guard against this, the mere giving of offence to individuals will evoke less hostility. The reason is, first, that one rarely comes across men so indignant at an unjust act as to endanger themselves to such an extent by seeking vengeance; and secondly, that, should they actually be inclined to do this and have the requisite power, they are restrained by the universal goodwill which they see that the prince enjoys.

Injuries may affect either a man’s property, his life or his honour. The threat of bloodshed is more dangerous than is the shedding of blood. To threaten to shed blood is, in fact, extremely dangerous: whereas to shed it is attended with no danger at all, for a dead man cannot contemplate vengeance, and those that remain alive usually leave you to do the contemplating. But a man who has been threatened and sees that he must of necessity either do something or be for it, has been turned into a real menace for the prince, as we shall cite cases presently to show.

Prescinding from the case in which action is imposed by necessity, injuries affecting a man’s property or honour are the two things which give men greater offence than anything else, and against them the prince should be on his guard, for he can never so despoil anyone but that there will remain to him a knife with which to wreak vengeance. Nor can he deprive a man of his honour to such an extent that his mind will cease to be set on vengeance. And of the honours of which men may be deprived, that which imports most is a woman’s honour, and, after that, contempt for a man’s person. It was this that caused Pausanias to take up arms against Philip of Macedon; and this that has caused many others to take up arms against many other princes. In our day Lucio Belanti would not have been moved to conspire against Pandolfo, the tyrant of Siena, if he had not given him his daughter to wife and then taken her away again, as we shall relate in due course. The chief cause which led the Pazzi to conspire against the Medici was the inheritance of Giovanni Bonromei of which they had been deprived by the Medici’s orders.

Another cause, and this a very powerful one, that makes men conspire against a prince, is the desire to liberate their fatherland of which a prince has seized possession. It was this that caused Brutus and Cassius to turn against Caesar; this that led to many other conspiracies, against Phalaris, Dionysius and against other usurpers of their country’s rights. Nor can any tyrant prevail over this spirit, except by discarding his tyranny. And since one does not find tyrants doing this, one finds few who have not come to a miserable end. Hence the verse of Juvenal:

To Pluto’s realm few kings unscathed descend,

Nor tyrants oft escape a sticky end.



One-man conspiracies

The dangers involved in conspiracies, as I have said above, are considerable, and go on all the time, for in a conspiracy dangers crop up alike in forming the plot, in carrying it out, and as a result or its having been carried out. Plots may be formed by one conspirator, or by several. If by one person only, it cannot rightly be called a conspiracy. Rather it is a firm resolve on the part of some individual to kill the prince. Of the three dangers conspiracies entail, a one-man conspiracy lacks the first. For no danger can arise before the time for action comes, since no one else being privy to the secret, there is no danger of the plot being carried to the ears of the prince. To make a resolve of this kind lies within the competence of anybody whatsoever, be he great, small, noble or insignificant,a intimate or not intimate with the prince. For anyone is allowed at some time or other to speak to the prince, and anyone who gets the chance of speaking to him, gets a chance to relieve his feelings. Pausanias, of whom we have already spoken several times, killed Philip of Macedon as he was on his way to the temple with a lot of armed men about him and his son on one side and his son-in-law on the other. The former, however, was a nobleman and an acquaintance of the prince. [But there are others.] A poor, miserable Spaniard stuck a dagger in the neck of Ferdinand, king of Spain, and, though the wound was not fatal, it shows us that a man of this type may have both the intention and the opportunity of doing such a thing. A dervish, or Turkish priest, struck at Bajazet, the father of the present Turk, with a scimitar. He did not kill him, but he certainly had the intention and the opportunity of so doing. One finds plenty of people, I think, who would like to do such things, for the intention is attended neither with penalty nor danger of any kind. Yet there are but few who actually do such things, and of those who do, there are very few, if any, who do not themselves get killed in the very act. Hence one does not find men keen on going to certain death. But let us leave these one-man plots and turn to conspiracies involving several people.

Conspiracies formed by the weak

I maintain that one finds in history that all conspiracies have been made by men of standing or else by men in immediate attendance on a prince,a for other people, unless they be sheer lunatics, cannot form a conspiracy; since men without power and those who are not touch with a prince are devoid alike of any hope and of any opportunity of carrying out a conspiracy successfully. For, first of all, men without power cannot get hold of anyone who will keep faith with them, since no one can consent to do what they want under any of those prospects which induce men to take great risks, so that, once the plot has been communicated to two or three people, an informer will turn up and they are ruined. Moreover, should they actually be lucky enough to avoid informers, the carrying out of the plot will involve them in such difficulties, owing to the lack of easy access to the prince, that it will be impossible for them to escape disaster in carrying out their scheme. For, if men of standing and those who have easy access succumb to these difficulties, which will be dealt with presently, it is to be expected that in the case of these others such difficulties will be magnified without end. Consequently, since when their lives and property are not at stake, men do not entirely lose their heads, they become cautious when they recognize their weakness, and when they get sick of a prince confine themselves to cursing him, and wait for those of higher standing than they have, to avenge them. So that, should one in fact come across somebody of this kind who has attempted such a thing, one should praise his intention but not his prudence.

Conspiracies formed by the strong

It would seem, then, that conspirators have all been men of standing or intimates of the prince, and, of these, those who have been moved to conspire by too many benefits are as numerous as those moved to conspire by too many injuries, as was the case with Perennis versus Commodus, Plautianus versus Severus, and Sejanus versus Tiberius. For to all these men their emperors had granted such wealth and so many honours and titles that there seemed to be nothing wanting to complete their power, save the imperial title; so, since with the lack of this they were unwilling to put up, they were moved to conspire against their prince, and their conspiracy in each case was attended with the results which their ingratitude merited.

Of similar conspiracies which have occurred in more recent times there is, however, one that met with success, that of Jacopo di Appiano against Messer Piero Gambacorti, prince of Pisa; for this Jacopo had been brought up by, reared by, and owed his reputation to, the very person whom later on he deprived of his power. There is also in our own times the conspiracy of Coppola against king Ferdinand of Aragon; the said Coppola having attained a greatness such that the only thing that seemed to him to be lacking was a kingdom, and since he made up his mind to acquire this, he lost his life. And yet, if any conspiracies against a prince, made by men of standing, ought to have succeeded it should surely have been this, since it was made by another king, so to speak, who had every convenience requisite to satisfying his desire. But that lust for domination, which blinds men, blinds them yet again in the way they set about the business: for, if they knew but how to do their evil deeds with prudence, it would be impossible for them not to succeed.

A warning to princes

A prince, therefore, who wants to guard against conspiracies, should fear those on whom he has conferred excessive favours more than those to whom he has done excessive injury. For the latter lack opportunity, whereas the former abound in it, and the desire is the same in both cases; for the desire to rule is as great as, or greater than, is the desire for vengeance. Consequently princes should confer on their friends an authority of such magnitude that between it and that of the prince there remains a certain interval, and between the two a something else to be desired. Otherwise it will be a strange thing if that does not happen to them which happened to the princes we have been talking about. But to return to the lines of our discourse.

The danger due to informers

Having said that conspirators must be men of standing and have easy access to the prince, I must now discuss the success of these, their undertaking, and inquire as to why some have succeeded and others have failed. As I have remarked above, in conspiracies there are three stages at which danger may be found to occur: at the start, while carrying them out, and afterwards. One finds that few conspiracies prove successful because it is impossible, or almost impossible, to pass through all three stages successfully. Let us begin by discussing the dangers incurred at the outset. These are the more important, I maintain, since there is need of great discretion and one must have considerable luck if, in making one’s plans, the plot is not to be discovered. Plots are discovered either from information received or by conjecture. Leakage of information is due either to lack of loyalty or to lack of discretion among those to whom you communicate the plot. Lack of loyalty may easily occur, because you can only communicate your plan to those in whom you have such confidence that you think they will risk death for your sake, or else to men who are discontented with the prince. Now there may be one or two persons whom you can trust, but it is impossible to find such men if you reveal your plans to many people, for the goodwill they bear you must indeed be great if the danger and the fear of punishment is not to outweigh it in their estimation. Men, too, quite frequently make mistakes about the affection another man has for them, nor can you be sure of it unless of it you have previously had experience, and to acquire experience in such a matter is a very risky business. Even should you have had experience of some other dangerous affair in which they have been loyal to you, you cannot infer from their loyalty in this case that they will be equally loyal in another which far exceeds it in dangers of all kinds. While if you judge of a person’s loyalty by the degree of disaffection he has for the prince, here, too, you may easily be mistaken; for by the very fact of your having opened your mind to such a malcontent, you provide him with material with which to obtain contentment, so that, if he is to keep faith with you, either his hatred must be great or your influence over him must be very great indeed.

It thus comes about that conspiracies are frequently revealed and are crushed at the very start. Indeed, it is looked on as a marvel if a plot which has been communicated to many people, remains secret for any length of time, as was the case with that formed by Piso against Nero, and in our day with that formed by the Pazzi against Lorenzo and Juliano de’ Medici, to which there were privy more than fifty persons and yet it was not discovered till it came to the point of execution.

The danger due to indiscretion

As to discovery due to lack of discretion, this comes about when a conspiracy is spoken of without due caution and a servant or some third person gets to hear of it, as happened to the sons of Brutus who were overheard discussing their plans with Tarquin’s messengers by a servant who informed against them. Or it may be due to your having lightly communicated it to a lady friend or to a boy friend or to some other frivolous person, as did Dymnus, who with Philotas and others conspired against Alexander the Great, and talked of the conspiracy to Nicomachus, a boy of whom he was fond, who at once told his brother, Cebalinus, about it, and Cebalinus told it to the king.

Discovery due to conjecture

As to discovery due to conjecture, we have an example of this in the Pisonian conspiracy formed against Nero, in which Scaevinus, one of the conspirators, made his will on the day before he had to kill Nero, ordered Milichus, his freedman, to have his old and rusty dagger sharpened up, freed all his slaves and gave them money, and had bandages got ready for binding up the wounded; from which facts Milichus conjectured that there was a plot and told Nero. Scaevinus was arrested, together with Natales, another conspirator, who had been seen talking together for a long time and in secret the day before; and, as their explanations did not agree, they were forced to tell the truth; so that the conspiracy was discovered, with disastrous results for all concerned in it.

The difficulty of preventing discovery

Against discovery due to such causes it is impossible so to guard as to prevent the plot being revealed, whether owing to malice, to indiscretion or to frivolous conversation, in all cases in which the number of those who are cognizant of it exceeds three or four. For, should more than one of the conspirators be arrested, it is impossible to prevent its coming out, because two cannot possibly agree as to every detail in the explanations they give. If only one man is arrested and he be a man of resolution, he may have sufficient strength of mind to be silent about his fellow conspirators. It is essential, however, that the other conspirators have no less courage than he has in standing their ground and not running away, for the conspiracy will be revealed by either party in which courage is lacking, whether by the man who has been arrested or those who are still at large.

There is, indeed, a rare case given by Titus Livy, namely, the conspiracy formed against Hieronymus, king of Syracuse, in which, when Theodotus, one of the conspirators, was arrested, he showed great virtue in concealing all the other conspirators, and accused the king’s own friends; and the other conspirators, on their part, had such confidence in Theodotus’ virtue, that not one of them left Syracuse or showed any other sign of fear.

Precautions against discovery

These, then, are the dangers to which a conspiracy is exposed in the course of its formation before the time comes for it to be carried out; and, if they are to be avoided, these are the remedies. The first, the safest and, to tell the truth, the only one, is not to allow the conspirators time to give information against you, and to tell them of your plan only when you are ready to act, and not before. Those who have so acted, at any rate escape the dangers involved in contriving the plot, and more often than not, the others also. All of them, in fact, have been successful, and any prudent man should find it possible to conduct things in this fashion. I shall cite two cases, and leave it at that.

Nelematus, being unable to stand the tyranny of Aristotimus, tyrant of Epirus, collected in his house many of his relations and friends, and exhorted them to set their country free. Some of them asked for time to consider the matter and to put their affairs in order. Whereupon Nelematus told his servants to lock the doors of the house, and to those whom he had called together said: ‘Either you swear to go and do the deed now, or I shall hand you all over as prisoners to Aristotimus.’ These words got them going; they took the oath, and, having set out without delay, they successfully carried out Nelematus’s instructions. When one of the Magi by subterfuge got possession of the Persian throne, and Otanes, one of the leading men in the kingdom, heard of it and discovered the fraud, he conferred with six other leading men in the state, and told them that it was for them to rid the kingdom of the tyranny of this Magus. When one of them asked for time, Darius, one of the six who had been called together by Otanes, got up and said: ‘Either we go at once and put this business through, or I shall go and lay information against the lot of you.’ So with one accord they got up, and succeeded in carrying out their plan before anyone had time to repent. Similar to these two cases also was the method the Aetolians adopted in order to kill Nabis, the Spartan tyrant; for they commissioned their fellow-citizen, Alexamenes, to go with thirty horse and two hundred foot ostensibly to the assistance of Nabis, communicated the secret only to Alexamenes, and told the rest to obey him on each and every point under pain of banishment. So Alexamenes went to Sparta and never mentioned the commission entrusted to him till he was ready to carry it out; with the result that he succeeded in killing Nabis. These folk, then, by adopting these methods, have avoided the dangers which attend the planning of a conspiracy; and those who follow their example will always avoid them.

Their practicability

That anyone can do as they did, I propose now to prove by citing the case of Piso, of whom mention has already been made. Piso was a man of very high standing and great repute, and was intimate with Nero, who had considerable confidence in him. Nero used frequently to dine with him in his gardens. Piso, therefore, could have made friends with men who in mentality, courage and inclination were of the right kind to carry out such a scheme, for to a man of standing this is quite an easy matter; and while Nero was in his gardens, he could have told them of the business and with suitable words got them to do what there would have been no time for them to refuse and what could not but have succeeded. Hence if we inquire into conspiracies in general, but few will be found that could not have been carried out in the same way. Ordinarily, however, men pay but little attention to the affairs of the world and so make frequently the gravest blunders, especially in matters which lie outside the ordinary run of things, as this does.

Further precautions

A plot, then, should never be divulged unless one is driven to it and it is ripe for execution, and if you, perforce, have to divulge it, it should be told to but one other person, and this a man of whom you have had very considerable experience, or else one who is actuated by the same motives as you are. To find such a man is far easier than to find several, and for this very reason is less dangerous. Moreover, should you, in fact, make a mistake, you have here a chance of protecting yourself, which is not the case where many conspirators are involved. For I have heard a wise man say that you can talk about anything to one person alone, since, unless you allow yourself to be persuaded to commit yourself in writing, one man’s ‘yes’ will be worth just as much as the other man’s ‘no’. And against writing anything down everybody should be on his guard as against a rock, for nothing is more likely to convict you than is your own handwriting. Plautianus, having made up his mind to kill the emperor, Severus, and his son, Antoninus, entrusted the secret to Saturninus, the tribune, who wanted to inform against him instead of doing what he wished, but was afraid that, when he brought the charge, more credence might be given to Plautianus than to himself. So he asked for something in writing that might serve as evidence of the commission entrusted to him. Blinded by ambition, Plautianus gave it him, with the result that the tribune brought the accusation and he was convicted. Yet without this commitment in writing and certain other evidence against him, Plautianus would have got the better of him, so brazen was he in denying the charge. There is then some chance of getting off when a charge is brought by but one person provided you cannot be convicted by a written document or other evidence telling against you, which one should take care not to provide.

In the Pisonian conspiracy there was a woman called Epicharis, who had formerly been Nero’s mistress. Since she thought it would help to get a captain of some triremes which served as Nero’s guard to join the conspirators, she told him of the plot, but not who the conspirators were. Subsequently, when the captain broke his word and charged her with it to Nero, Epicharis denied the charge with such vehemence that Nero could not make up his mind and let her off. There are, then, in communicating a plot to a single other person two dangers: the first is that he may accuse you of his own accord; and the second is that he may get arrested on suspicion or because there is some evidence against him, and accuse you when convicted and constrained by torture to do so. In both these cases the danger is not irremediable; for in the first case you can deny the charge and allege that he made it because he hated you; and in the second you can deny it, alleging that under force he has been compelled to tell a lie.

Unpremeditated assassination

The wisest thing, therefore, is not to tell anybody what you are about, but to act in accordance with the examples given above; or, if you have to tell somebody, not to tell more than one, in which case, though the danger will be somewhat greater, it will not be so great as if you had told it to many. The case is somewhat the same when necessity constrains you to do that to a prince which you see that the prince is about to do to you, for your need is then so great that it does not give you time to think of precautions. A necessity of this kind almost always leads to the end desired; and, to prove it, I propose to give just two examples.

Among the chief friends and intimates which the emperor, Commodus, had, were Laetus and Eclectus, who were in charge of his praetorian troops, and for one of his principal concubines or lady friends he had Marcia; and because they sometimes reproached him for sullying alike his person and his imperial position by his behaviour, he decided to put them to death, and made out a list on which he wrote the names of Marcia, Laetus and Eclectus, and several others whom he proposed on the following night to put to death. This list he put under the pillow of his bed. Having gone to wash himself, a favourite little boy of his was romping about the room and on the bed when he came across the list, and, having gone outside with it in his hand, met Marcia, who took it from him, and, having read it and noted its contents, sent at once for Laetus and Eclectus. All three of them realizing the danger in which they stood, decided to forestall it; so, without wasting any unnecessary time, they killed Commodus the following night.

Again, the emperor Antoninus Caracalla, when with his army in Mesopotamia, had as his prefect, Macrinus, who was more of a civilian than a soldier; and, as is usually the case with princes who are not good, he was for ever afraid that others should not act towards him as he thought he deserved. So Antoninus wrote to Maternianus, a friend of his in Rome, to request him to inquire of the astrologers whether anybody was aspiring to become emperor, and to advise him accordingly. Maternianus, therefore, wrote him that Macrinus was the man who had this idea in mind, but the letter fell into the hands of Macrinus before it got to the emperor, and, in consequence, Macrinus saw that it was necessary either to kill him before a further letter came from Rome, or to be killed; so he instructed Martialis, a centurion who was devoted to him and whose brother Antoninus had killed a few days before, to assassinate the emperor, a commission which he carried out successfully.

Hence we see that when necessity becomes so urgent that it leaves no time for delay, it produces much the same effect as does the method adopted by Nelematus of Epirus, which I have described above. We see, too, that what I have said almost at the beginning of this discourse, also holds good, namely, that threats do more harm to princes and are more likely to result in conspiracies than the actual infliction of injuries. Against threats, therefore, a prince should be on his guard; for either he should make a fuss of men or should make sure they will do him no harm, but in no case should he put them in such a position that the only courses which appear open to them are either to get killed or to kill somebody else.

Dangers arising from a change of plan

As to the dangers which occur during the carrying out of a plot, these are due either to a change of plan, or to lack of courage on the part of the person who is to carry it out, or to the operative’s making; some mistake owing to carelessness, or to failure to complete the job in that there remain alive some of those who were to have been killed. I would here point out, therefore, that nothing so perturbs and interferes with anything undertaken by men as does their having suddenly and without due notice to change their plan and to give up that laid down at the start. And, if such a change of plan anywhere gives rise to disorder, it is in military operations and in affairs such as those of which we are speaking; because in a business of this kind what it is essential to do first and foremost is to get clearly into the heads of those concerned the part which each of them has to play, and, if men have for several days been picturing to themselves a certain course of action and a certain plan, and this is suddenly changed, it is impossible but that it should throw everything out of gear and spoil the whole scheme. So that it is much better to carry out the original plan, even if one sees in it certain inconveniences, than it is to cancel it and thereby to involve oneself in a host of inconveniences. This applies to cases in which there is no time to draw up a new plan, for, if there is time, a man can arrange matters as he pleases.

The conspiracy of the Pazzi against Lorenzo and Giuliano de’ Medici is familiar to all. According to the plan that had been given out, they were to be invited to dinner with the Cardinal of St George, and at the dinner were to be assassinated. Those who were to kill them, those who were to seize the palace and those who were to run about the city calling on the people to free themselves, had all been detailed. It happened that, when the Pazzi, the Medici and the Cardinal were attending a solemn function in the cathedral church of Florence, it became known that Giuliano was not going to dine with them that day; so the conspirators got together and decided that what they had been going to do in the house of the Medici should be done in the church. This upset the whole plan, for Giovambatista da Montesecco declined to take part in the murder, since he was not going to do it in church, he said. So they had to find new operatives and to redistribute the parts assigned, and, since there was no time for them to get clear as to their parts, they made such blunders in carrying it out that they were overcome.

Failure due to irresolution

Irresolution on the part of operatives in doing their job, is due either to human respect or to personal cowardice. Such is the majesty and the respect inspired by the presence of a prince that it may easily damp the resolution of an operative or terrify him. When Marius was taken prisoner by the Minturnians a slave was sent to kill him, but, so overawed was he by the presence of such a man and by the recollection of what his name stood for, that he lost courage and hadn’t the strength to kill him. If, then, such power appertains to a man who is chained up in prison and overwhelmed with misfortune, how much greater must be that of a prince who is not thus encumbered, but is there in his majesty, wearing his robes and decorations, surrounded by pomp and by his courtiers. Such pomp as this may well affright you, or again the graciousness of his welcome may soften you. Certain persons were conspiring against Sitalces, king of Thrace, had settled the day on which the deed was to be done, and had got to the place assigned at which the prince then was; yet none of them ventured to attack him, so that at length they went away without trying to do anything and without quite knowing what had prevented them, each laying the blame on the other. They made the same mistake more than once, so that in the end the conspiracy was discovered and they were punished for a crime which they could have committed but were reluctant to commit. Two of his brothers conspired against Alfonso, Duke of Ferrara, and used as an intermediary Giannes, a priest and a cantor in the duke’s employ. Several times at their request he got the duke to meet them, so that it lay in their power to kill him; in spite of which not one of them dared to do it, so that, the plot being discovered, they suffered the penalty of their wickedness and their want of prudence. Such negligence could not have been due to anything except their being frightened by the presence of the prince or humbled by some gracious act of his.

Failure due to perturbation of mind

Inconveniences in the carrying out of a conspiracy are due to mistakes caused either by lack of prudence or by lack of courage, for both these two things may befall you and cause you such confusion of mind that you say and do what you oughtn’t to say or do. That men do get thus overwhelmed and confused cannot be better illustrated than by what Titus Livy tells us of Alexamenes, the Aetolian, who had made up his mind to kill Nabis the Spartan, of whom we have already spoken. When the time came to do it, he explained to his men what it was they had to do, and, says Livy, ‘pulled himself together, for his mind had become confused by thinking of so great a matter’. It is, indeed, impossible, that any man, even though he be strongminded, familiar with death and accustomed to using the sword, should not become confused. Hence men should be chosen who have had experience in doing such deeds, and one should entrust them to no one else, brave as he may be thought to be. For when it comes to doing big things of which a man has had no previous experience, no one can say for certain what will happen. This confusion, for instance, might be such as to cause you to let the weapon fall from your hand, or to let slip some word which would have precisely the same effect. Lucilla, the sister of Commodus, arranged with Quintianus to kill him. Quintianus lay in wait for Commodus at the entrance to the amphitheatre, and, going up to him with a naked dagger, greeted him with the words: ‘The senate sends you this!’, words which led to his being arrested before he had lowered his arm to strike. Messer Antonio de Volterra was deputed, as we have already said, to kill Lorenzo de’ Medici. On coming up to him he said: ‘Ah, traitor!’, an exclamation which saved Lorenzo’s life and ruined the conspiracy.

Conspiracies directed against more than one prince

It is not easy to do the thing perfectly when a conspiracy is directed against one ruler, for the reasons alleged, and still less is it easy to do it perfectly when a conspiracy is directed against two. On the contrary, it is so difficult that it is almost impossible for the conspiracy to succeed. For it is almost impossible to do similar actions in different places at one and the same time, and you cannot perform them at different times if you do not want one to spoil the other. Hence, if to conspire against one prince is a doubtful, dangerous and imprudent undertaking, to conspire against two is altogether foolish and frivolous. Were it not for my respect for the historian I should never have thought that what Herodian says of Plautianus were possible, namely, that he should have commissioned the same person, Saturninus the centurion, to kill both Severus and Antoninus who dwelt in different places, for the thing is so utterly unreasonable that nothing short of his authority would make me believe it.

Certain Athenian youths conspired against Diocles and Hippias, tyrants ruling in Athens. They killed Diocles, but Hippias escaped and avenged him. Chion and Leonides of Heraclea, disciples of Plato, conspired against the tyrants, Clearchus and Satyrus. They killed Clearchus, but Satyrus remained alive to avenge him. The Pazzi, whom we have mentioned more than once, only succeeded in killing Giuliano. Hence no one should engage in conspiracies against more than one ruler since he will do not good either to himself or to his country or to anybody at all. On the contrary, those who survive, will become more insupportable and more bitter, as Florence, Athens and Heraclea, to which I have already alluded, found out. True, the conspiracy which Pelopidas formed for the liberation of Thebes, his fatherland, involved all these difficulties, and yet was successful; for Pelopidas conspired not only against two tyrants, but against ten, and not only was he an outsider to whom access to the tyrants presented a difficulty, but he was a rebel. None the less, he was able to get into Thebes, to kill the tyrants and to liberate his country. Actually, however, it was with the assistance of Charon, counsellor to the tyrants, that he did all this, for it was through him that he gained easy access to do the deed. Nor should anyone nevertheless emulate his example; for it was an impossible undertaking and a marvellous thing that it succeeded. It was also, as all writers are agreed who have mentioned it, a rare and almost unparalleled thing.57

Failure due to false impressions

The carrying out of a plot may be ruined by a false impression or by an unforeseen accident which occurs in the course of it. On the very morning on which Brutus and the other conspirators had decided to kill Caesar, it happened that he held a long conversation with Gaius Pompilius Lenas, who was one of the conspirators, and when the others saw him talking for so long, they wondered whether the said Pompilius was not telling Caesar of the conspiracy, and were on the point of killing him there and then, without waiting for him to come into the senate. They would, indeed, have done this, had the argument not come to an end and had they not then been reassured when they saw Caesar gave no sign of unusual emotion. False impressions of this kind should be taken into account and due attention be paid to them, if one would be prudent; the more so in that it is easy to get such false impressions. For, when a man has a bad conscience, he readily believes that people are talking about him, and a remark which is irrelevant may disturb your equanimity and make you think that it has bearing on your business, and this causes you either to give the conspiracy away by running off, or to muddle it by acting before the proper time. And the more there are who are in the know, the more likely is this to happen.

Failure due to unforeseen accidents

As to accidents, since they cannot be foreseen, the only thing one can do is to give examples showing how cautious men ought to be in regard to them. Lucio Belanti of Siena, of whom mention has already been made, was so indignant with Pandolfo, who had taken away the daughter he had previously given him in marriage, that he decided to kill him, and chose the occasion as follows. Pandolfo used to go daily to visit a sick relative, and, in doing so, passed by Lucio’s house. Lucio, having noticed this, arranged for his conspirators to be ready in his house to kill Pandolfo as he was going by. He placed them inside the doorway with their arms, and stationed one of them at the window ready to give the signal when Pandolfo was to pass by the doorway, whereupon they were at once to issue forth. It so happened that, when Pandolfo came along and the signal had been given, Pandolfo met a friend who stopped him, and some of those who were with him went on ahead, saw what was happening, heard the clatter of arms and so discovered the trap; with the result that Pandolfo escaped and Lucio and his accomplices had to fly from Siena. Thus this accidental meeting interfered with the business in hand and caused Lucio’s scheme to end in disaster. Since accidents, such as these, are of rare occurrence, it is impossible to prescribe any remedy. What one must do is to consider everything that is likely to happen, and to provide accordingly.

Dangers subsequent to a conspiracy

It remains now for us to discuss the dangers that may occur after a conspiracy has been successfully carried out. There is but one. It is that someone may be left alive who will avenge the death of the prince. There may, for instance, remain brothers or sons or other supporters to whom the principality was expected to come. Survival of those who may wreak vengeance may be due either to your negligence or to the causes mentioned above. Thus, when Giovanni Andrea da Lampognano and his accomplices had killed the Duke of Milan, there remained one of his sons and two of his brothers, who in due course came to avenge his death. In cases such as these the conspirators have an excuse, for there is nothing they can do about it; but when it is owing to lack of prudence or to their negligence that someone is left alive, they have in that case no excuse. Some conspirators who were citizens of Forli, killed Count Girolamo, their Lord, and took prisoner his wife and his children, who were little ones. It seemed to them, however, that their lives would scarce be safe unless they could get hold of the citadel, which its governor declined to hand over. So Mistress Catherine, as the countess was called, promised the conspirators that, if they would let her go to the citadel, she would arrange for it to be handed over to them. Meanwhile they were to keep her children as hostages. On this understanding the conspirators let her go to the citadel, from the walls of which, when she got inside, she reproached them with killing her husband and threatened them with vengeance in every shape and form. And to convince them that she did not mind about her children she exposed her sexual parts to them and said she was still capable of bearing more. The conspirators, dumbfounded, realized their mistake too late, and paid the penalty for their lack of prudence by suffering perpetual banishment.

But of all the dangers that may ensue after a successful conspiracy there is none more inevitable or more to be dreaded than when the people are well disposed to the prince you have killed; for in such a case, since there is no remedy to which the conspirators can have recourse, there is no chance of their ever obtaining security. Caesar is a case in point, for he was avenged by the people of Rome who were friendlily disposed towards him; and of the conspirators, after they had been driven out of Rome, one and all were killed at various times and in various places.

Conspiracies against one’s country

Conspiracies against one’s country are less dangerous to those who take part in them than are conspiracies against princes, since fewer dangers occur in the planning or them than in the latter case; in carrying them out they are the same; and afterwards there are none. There are not many dangers in planning the conspiracy because a citizen can scheme to obtain power without revealing his mind or his plan to anybody else, and, if his schemes are not interfered with, success will attend his undertaking; while if they should be interfered with by some law or other, he must bide his time and look for some other opening. This applies to a republic which is to some extent corrupt, for, since in one that is not corrupt no starting on evil courses there finds a place, no citizen is likely to harbour such thoughts. There are, then, all manner of ways and means of which citizens who aspire to a principality can avail themselves without running any risk of getting into trouble, alike because a republic is slower to take action than is a prince, is less suspicious, and for this reason less cautious, and because it has more respect for citizens of standing, and, in consequence, the latter are more daring and more inclined to act contrary to its interests. Everybody has read Sallust’s account of the conspiracy of Catiline, and is aware that Catiline not only remained in Rome after the conspiracy was discovered, but attended the senate, where he made opprobrious remarks about the senate and about the consuls, so great was the respect which this city had for its citizens. Nor, when he had left Rome and was already in touch with the armies, would Lentulus and others have been arrested if they had not had in their possession letters in their own hand which plainly showed their complicity.

Again, when Hanno, one of the leading citizens in Carthage, who hoped to set up a tyranny, had arranged to poison the whole senate at the marriage-feast of one of his daughters, and afterwards to make himself prince, all the senate did, when it got to hear of the business, was to pass a law restricting the amount to be spent on banquets and marriages, so great was the respect they had for a man in his position.

On the other hand, it may well be that in carrying out a conspiracy against one’s country there is more difficulty and the dangers are greater, for in a conspiracy aimed at so many people your own forces will scarce suffice; and not everybody has an army at his disposal, as had Caesar, Agathocles, Cleomenes and such-like, who have at one stroke subjugated their country by means of the forces they commanded. For to such folk the way is easy enough and safe enough; but others who have not such forces at their disposal, must give effect to their designs either by means of deceit and artifice or with the help of foreign troops. The use of deceit and artifice is illustrated in the case of Pisistratus, the Athenian, who by his victory over the Megarians gained favour with the people. One morning he appeared in public, wounded, said that the nobility out of envy had attacked him, and asked that he might go about with an armed force for the protection of his person. This being authorized, he had no difficulty in arrogating to himself such great power that he became tyrant of Athens. Pandolfo Petrucci, on his return to Siena with other exiles, was given command of the guard in the Piazza, a routine business which others had refused; yet this armed force in course of time acquired for him such repute that he became before long a prince. Many others have adopted other devices and other methods and in course of time and without danger have achieved their aim.

Those who have conspired to get control of their country by means of their own forces or with foreign armies have met with varied success according as fortune has favoured them or not. Catiline, whom we mentioned above, perished in the attempt. Hanno, of whom also we made mention, having failed to succeed by using poison, armed several thousands of his partisans, and both he and they were slain. Some of the principal citizens of Thebes called in a Spartan army to help them, and set up a tyranny in that city. If, then, we inquire into all the conspiracies men have made against their country, it will be found that none of them, or but few, have been suppressed while the plot was being contrived, but that all of them have either succeeded or been ruined when it came to carrying them out. Nor, when successful, do they entail any subsequent dangers other than those which pertain to a principality by its very nature. For, given that a man has become a tyrant, he is faced with the dangers which tyranny naturally and normally involves, and to avert them has no remedies other than those that we have already discussed.

The use of poison

This is all that needs to be said about conspiracies, and if I have taken account of those in which the sword and not poison has been used, it is because they are all of one and the same pattern. It is true that the use of poison is more dangerous owing to its being more uncertain, for not everybody has the commodity, so that those who have it must needs be consulted and the necessity of consulting others means danger to yourself. Again, for a variety of reasons, a poisoned drink may not prove fatal, as those discovered who were to kill Commodus, for, on his throwing up the poison they had given him, they were forced to strangle him if they wanted him to die.

Tactics to be used in suppressing a conspiracy

There is nothing, then, more inimical to princes than a conspiracy. For, when a conspiracy is formed against them, either they set killed or they incur infamy; since, if it succeeds, they die, and if it is discovered and they kill the conspirators, the conspiracy is apt to be regarded as a device on the part of the prince whereby to cloak his avarice and his cruelty vis-à-vis the lives and property of those he has put to death. I must not, therefore, neglect to warn that prince or that republic who knows that a conspiracy has been planned, to endeavour to discover its precise character before they take punitive action, and to compare carefully the strength and standing of the conspirators with their own; and, should they find it large and powerful, to take no notice of it until they have at their disposal enough forces to crush it. To act otherwise is but to court disaster. Hence they should practise dissimulation as best they can, lest the conspirators, finding themselves discovered, be driven of necessity to take immediate action regardless of the result.

The Romans afford us an example of this. Two legions of soldiers were left to guard Capua against the Samnites, as we have pointed out elsewhere. Those who were in command of these legions conspired together to reduce the Capuans to subjection. When this came to be known in Rome, Rutilus, a new consul, was commissioned to look into the matter. To keep the conspirators quiet, he made public the senate confirmation of the Capuan legions’ lodging quarters. The troops believed this, and, since there seemed to them to be plenty of time to carry out their plan, they made no attempt to hurry things. So matters stood until they came to realize that the consul had separated one legion from the other, which caused them to grow suspicious, to come out into the open and to give orders for their scheme to be put into execution. Nor can there be a better example than this from whichever point of view we look at it, for we see how slow men are to act when they think they have time, and how quick to act when the need becomes urgent. Nor yet can a prince or a republic that wants to postpone the discovery of a conspiracy in its own interests do better than artfully to provide the conspirators with an opportunity at some future date, so that, while they await it in the belief that there is no hurry, that prince or that republic may have time to arrange for their punishment.

Those who have acted otherwise have but hastened their own downfall, as the Duke of Athens did, and Guglielmo de’ Pazzi. When the duke became tyrant of Florence and heard that a conspiracy had been formed against him, he had one of the conspirators arrested but did not inquire further into the matter, with the result that the rest at once flew to arms and deprived him of the government. When Guglielmo was commissioner in the Val di Chiana in 1501 and learned that a conspiracy in favour of the Virelli had been formed in Arezzo whereby the Florentines were to be deprived of that town, he went at once to that city, and without considering either the strength of the conspirators or his own and without having any forces in readiness, on the advice of the bishop, his son, he had one of the conspirators arrested. After the arrest, the remaining conspirators at once took up arms, took the town from the Florentines and Guglielmo became a prisoner instead of a commissioner.

But when conspiracies are weak they both can, and ought, to be suppressed without further ado. Nor should either of the two following expedients be adopted, though one is almost the exact opposite of the other. One was used by the aforesaid Duke of Athens, who to show that he believed the Florentines to be well disposed towards him, put to death a man who had told him of a conspiracy. The other was adopted by Dion, the Syracusan, who, to discover the intentions of someone of whom he was suspicious, allowed Callippus, whom he trusted, to pretend to be forming a conspiracy. Both these expedients led to disaster, for the first discouraged informers and encouraged would-be conspirators, and the second made it an easy matter to compass Dion’s death by means of the very conspiracy of which he was the real head, as he learned by experience, for Callippus was now able without further ado to plot against Dion, and he plotted so well that he deprived him both of his state and of his life.





Book Three



[DISCOURSES 7–9]


[The Need of Adaptation to Environment]