# Chapter 1 CHAPTER II Machiavelli's Intention: The Prince M ANY WRITERS have attempted to describe the intention of the Prince by using the term "scientific."This description is defensible and even helpful pro- vided it is properly meant.Let us return once more to the begin- ning.In the Epistle Dedicatory Machiavelli gives three indications of the subject-matter of the book:he has incorporated in it his knowledge of the actions of great men both modern and ancient; he dares to discuss princely government and to give rules for it; he possesses knowledge of the nature of princes.As appears from the Epistle Dedicatory,from the book itself,and from what the author says elsewhere,knowledge of the actions of great men, i.e.,historical knowledge,supplies only materials for knowledge of what princely government is,of the characteristics of the various kinds of principalities,of the rules with which one must comply in order to acquire and preserve princely power,and of the nature of princes.It is only knowledge of the latter kind that the Prince is meant to convey.That kind of knowledge,knowledge of the universal or general as distinguished from the individual,is called philosophic or scientific. The 》Pc《e is a scientific book because MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》55《 it conveys a general teaching that is based on reasoning from experience and that sets forth that reasoning.That teaching is partly theoretical(knowledge of the nature of princes)and partly practical(knowledge of the rules with which the prince must com- ply).In accordance with the fact that the Prince is a scientific, and not an historical book,only three of twenty-six chapter head- ings contain proper names.2 When referring to the Prince in the Discourses,Machiavelli calls it a“treatise.”3 For the time being we shall describe the Prince as a treatise,meaning by“treatise”a book that sets forth a general teaching of the character indicated. To the extent that the Prince is a treatise,it has a lucid plan and its argument proceeds in a straight line without either ascend- ing or descending.It consists at first sight of two parts.The first part sets forth the science or the art of princely government while the second takes up the time honored question of the limits of art or prudence,or the question of the relation of art or pru- dence and chance.More particularly,the Prince consists of four parts:I)the various kinds of principalities(chs.I-II),2)the prince and his enemies(chs.I2-14),3)the prince and his subjects or friends(chs.I5-23),⁴4)prudence and chance(chs.24-26). We may go a step further and say that the Prince appears,at the outset,not only as a treatise but even as a scholastic treatise. At the same time,however,the book is the opposite of a scien- tific or detached work.While beginning with the words“All states,all dominions which have had and have sway over men," it ends with the words“the ancient valor in Italian hearts is not yet dead."It culminates in a passionate call to action-in a call, addressed to a contemporary Italian prince,to perform the most glorious deed possible and necessary then and there.It ends like a tract for the times.For the last part deals not merely with the general question concerning the relation of prudence and chance, but it is concerned with the accidental also in another sense of the term.The chapters surrounding the explicit discussion of the relation between prudence and chance(ch.25)are the only ones whose headings indicate that they deal with the contemporary Italian situation.The Prince is not the only classic of political philosophy which is both a treatise and a tract for the times.It suffices to refer to Hobbes' Leviathan and Locke's Civil Govern- ment.But the case of the Prince is not typical:there is a striking 》56《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAYELLI contrast between the dry,not to say scholastic,beginning and the highly rhetorical last chapter which ends in a quotation from a patriotic poem in Italian.Could Machiavelli have had the am- bition of combining the virtues of scholasticism with those of patriotic poetry?Is such a combination required for the under- standing of political things?However this may be,the contrast between the beginning of the Prince, or even its first twenty-five chapters,and its end forces us to modify our remark that the argument of the book proceeds in a straight line without ascending or descending.By directly contrasting the beginning and the end, we become aware of an ascent.To the extent to which the Prince is a treatise,Machiavelli is an investigator or a teacher;to the extent to which it is a tract for the times,he assumes the role of an adviser,if not of a preacher.He was anxious to become the adviser of the addressee of the Prince and thus to rise from his low,and even abject condition.B The movement of the Prince is an ascent in more than one sense.And besides,it is not simply an ascent. In contradistinction to the Discourses,the Prince comes first to sight as a traditional or conventional treatise.But this first ap- pearance is deliberately deceptive.The antitraditional character of the Prince becomes explicit shortly beyond the middle of the book,and after remaining explicit for some time,it recedes again. Hence the movement of the Prince may be described as an ascent followed by a descent.Roughly speaking,the peak is in the center.This course is prefigured in the first part of the book (chs.I-II):the highest theme of this part(new principalities ac- quired by one's own arms and virtue)and the grandest examples (Moses,Theseus,Romulus,Cyrus)are discussed in chapter 6, which is literally the central chapter of the first part. But let us follow this movement somewhat more closely.At first sight,the Prince belongs to the traditional genre of mirrors of princes which are primarily addressed to legitimate princes, and the most familiar case of the legitimate prince is the un- disputed heir.Machiavelli almost opens the Prince by following custom in calling the hereditary prince the "natural prince."He suggests that the natural is identical with the established or cus- tomary,the ordinary and the reasonable;or that it is the opposite of the violent.In the first two chapters he uses only contempo- MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》57《 rary or almost contemporary Italian examples:we do not leave the dimension of the familiar.We cannot help noting that in the Discourses,which open with his declaration that he will communi- cate therein new modes and orders,the first two chapters are devoted to the remote beginnings of cities and states:we immedi- ately transcend the dimension of the familiar.In the third chapter of the Prince,he continues to speak of “the natural and ordinary” and “the ordinary and reasonable”but he now makes it clear that nature favors the established no more than the disestablishment of the established or,more generally stated,that the natural and ordinary stands in a certain tension to the customary:since the desire for acquisition is"natural and ordinary,"the destruction of "natural"princes,"the extinction of ancient blood,"by an extraordinary conqueror is perhaps more natural than the peaceful and smooth transition from one ordinary heir to another.7 In ac- cordance with this step forward,foreign and ancient examples come to the fore:the Turks and above all the Romans appear to be superior to the Italians and even to the French.Provoked by the remark of a French Cardinal that the Italians know nothing of war,and thus justified,Machiavelli replied,as he re- ports here,that the French know nothing of politics:the Romans, whose modes of action are discussed in the center of the chapter, understood both war and politics.Furthermore,he transcends the Here and Now also by referring to a doctrine of the physicians, for medicine is an achievement of the ancients,8 and by opposing the wise practice of the Romans to“what is everyday in the mouth of the sages of our times."But he is not yet prepared to take issue with the opinion held by more than one contemporary according to which faith must be kept.In chapters 4-6,ancient examples preponderate for the first time.Chapter 6 is devoted to the most glorious type of wholly new princes in wholly new states,i.e.,to what is least ordinary and most ancient.The heroic founders discussed therein acquired their positions by virtue,and not by chance,and their greatness revealed itself by their success in introducing wholly new modes and orders which differed pro- foundly from the established,familiar,and ancient.They stand at the opposite pole from the customary and old established,for two opposite reasons:they were ancient innovators,ancient enemies of the ancient.Chapter 6 is the only chapter of the Prince in which 》58《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI Machiavelli speaks of prophets,i.e.,of men to whom God speaks. In the same chapter there occurs the first Latin quotation.Com- pared with that chapter,the rest of the first part marks a descent. The hero of chapter 7 is Cesare Borgia,who acquired his prin- cipality by means of chance.He is presented at the outset as simply a model for new princes.But,to say nothing of the fact that he failed because of a grave mistake of his,he was not a wholly new prince in a wholly new state:he is a model for such new princes as try to make changes in ancient orders by means of new modes rather than for such new princes,like the heroes of chapter 6,as try to introduce wholly new modes and orders. Accordingly,the emphasis shifts to modern examples from this point on.⁹As for chapters 8-II,it suffices to note that even their chapter headings no longer contain references to new princes; the princes discussed therein were at most new princes in old states.The last two chapters of the first part contain,as did the first two chapters,only modern examples,although the last two chapters contain also examples other than Italian. The second part(chs.I2-14)marks an ascent from the end of the first part.The first part had ended with a discussion of ecclesiastical principalities,which as such are unarmed.We learn now that good arms are the necessary and sufficient condition for good laws.10 As Machiavelli indicates through the headings of chapters I2-13,he ascends in these chapters from the worst kind of arms to the best.We note in this part an almost continuous ascent from modern examples to ancient ones.This ascent is ac- companied by three references to the question as to whether mod- ern or ancient examples should be chosen;in the central reference it is suggested that it would be more natural to prefer ancient examples.11 Machiavelli now takes issue not only with specific po- litical or military errors committed by“the sages of our times” but(although without mentioning his name)with his contempo- rary Savonarola's fundamental error:Savonarola erroneously be- lieved that the ruin of Italy was caused by religious sins,and not by military sins.In this fairly short part(about Io pages)Machia- velli refers six times to ancient literature while he had referred to it in the considerably more extensive first part(about 37 pages)only twice.Only in the second part does he come close to referring deferentially to the highest authorities of political or MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》59《 moral thought.He refers,not indeed to the New Testament,but to the Old,and not indeed to what the Old Testament says about Moses but to what it says about David,and not to what it says about David literally but to what it says about David,or in con- nection with David,figuratively.And he refers,not indeed to Aristotle,or to Plato,but to Xenophon whom he regarded how- ever as the author of the classic mirror of princes.Besides,the Old Testament citation in chapter I3 merely supplies at most an additional example of the correct choice of arms;Xenophon's Ed- ucation of Cyrus, mentioned at the end of chapter I4,however, is the only authority he refers to as setting forth a complete moral code for a prince.To say the least,the height reached at the end of the second part recalls the height reached in the center of the first part:the second part ends and culminates in a praise of Cyrus —one of the four “grandest examples”spoken of in chapter 6.In the first part,Machiavelli leisurely ascends to the greatest doers and then leisurely descends again;in the second part he ascends quickly to the origins of the traditional understanding of the greatest doers. Right at the beginning of the third part(chs.I5-23)Machia- velli begins to uproot the Great Tradition.The emphasis is on a change in the general teaching:the first chapter of the third part is the only chapter of the Prince which does not contain any historical examples.Machiavelli now takes issue explicitly and coherently with the traditional and customary view according to which the prince ought to live virtuously and ought to rule vir- tuously.From this we begin to understand why he refrained in the second part from referring to the highest authorities:the missing peak above the Old Testament and Xenophon is not the New Testament and Plato or Aristotle but Machiavelli's own thought:all ancient or traditional teachings are to be superseded by a shockingly new teaching.But he is careful not to shock any- one unduly.While the claim to radical innovation is suggested,it is made in a subdued manner:he suggests that he is merely stating in his own name and openly a teaching which some ancient writers had set forth covertly or by using their characters as their mouth- pieces.12 Yet this strengthens Machiavelli's claim in truth as much as it weakens it in appearance:one cannot radically change the mode of a teaching without radically changing its substance.The 》60《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI argument ascends from chapter I5 up to chapters I9 or 20 and then descends again.In chapter I7 Machiavelli begins to speak again of "new princes,"after a pause of 1o chapters,and he con- tinues to do so in the three subsequent chapters;at the beginning of chapter 2I he still refers to "a quasi-new prince,"but in the rest of the third part this high theme disappears completely: Machiavelli descends again to ordinary or second rate princes.13 This movement is paralleled by a change regarding modern or ancient examples.Up through chapter I9,there is,generally speaking,an increase in emphasis on the ancient;thereafter mod- ern examples preponderate obviously.14 The last two-thirds of chapter I9,which deal with the Roman emperors,may be said to mark the peak of the third part.The passage is introduced as a rejoinder to what“many"might object against Machiavelli's own opinion.Chapter 19 is literally the center of the third part, just as the peak of the first part was literally its center(ch.6). This is no accident.Chapter 19 completes the explicit discussion of the founder while chapter 6 had begun it.Hence we may justly describe chapter 19 as the peak of the Prince as a whole,and the third part as its most important part.15 Chapter I9 reveals the truth about the founders,or the greatest doers almost fully.16 The full revelation requires the universalization of the lesson derived from the study of the Roman emperors,and this universalization is presented in the first section of chapter 2o.Immediately thereafter the descent begins.Machiavelli refers there to a saying of “our ancients,"i.e.,of the reputedly wise men of old Florence,and rejects it in an unusually cautious manner:17 after having broken with the most exalted teaching of the venerable Great Tradition, he humbly returns to a show of reverence for a fairly recent and purely local tradition.Shortly afterwards he expresses his agreement with"the judgment of many,"and immediately before questioning the wisdom of building fortresses and before showing that the practice of building fortresses had wisely been abandoned by a considerable number of Italian contemporaries,he says that he praises the building of fortresses "because it has been used from ancient times."18 He shows every sign of wishing to pretend that he believes in the truth of the equation of the good with the ancient and the customary.Acting in the same spirit he expresses there a belief in human gratitude,respect for justice,and honesty¹9 MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》6I《 which is quite at variance with everything that went before,and especially with what he said in the third part. Just as the movement of the argument in the third part resembles that in the first part,the movement of the argument in the fourth part(chs.24-26)resembles that in the second part.In contrast to the last chapters of the third part,the fourth part is marked by the following characteristics:Machiavelli speaks again of the“new prince,"and even "the new prince in a new principality”and he again emphasizes ancient models.Philip of Macedon,"not the father of Alexander,but the one who was defeated by Titus Quintus,"i.e.,an ancient prince who did not belong to the highest class of princes,is presented as vastly superior to the contemporary Italian princes who also were defeated.While the central chapter of the fourth part contains only modern examples,it compensates for this,as it were,by being devoted to an attack on a contempo- rary Italian belief,or rather on a belief which is more commonly held in contemporary Italy than it was in the past.In the last chapter,Moses,Cyrus,and Theseus,three of the four heroic founders praised in chapter 6,are mentioned again;Moses and Theseus had not been mentioned since.In that chapter Machiavelli speaks in the most unrestrained terms of what he hopes for from a contemporary Italian prince or from the latter's family.But he does not leave the slightest doubt that what he hopes for from a contemporary new prince in a new state is not more than at best a perfect imitation of the ancient founders,an imitation made possible by the survival of the Italians'ancient valor:he does not expect a glorious deed of an entirely new kind,or a new creation. While the last chapter of the Prince is thus a call to a most glorious imitation of the peaks of antiquity within contemporary Italy,the general teaching of the Prince,and especially of its third part,i.e. Machiavelli's understanding of the ancient founders and of the foundation of society in general,is the opposite of an imitation, however perfect:while the greatest deed possible in contempo- rary Italy is an imitation of the greatest deeds of antiquity,the greatest theoretical achievement possible in contemporary Italy is “wholly new.”20 We conclude,therefore,that the movement of the Prince as a whole is an ascent followed by a descent. It is characteristic of the Prince to partake of two pairs of opposites:it is both a treatise and a tract for the times,and it 》62《 THOUGHTSON MACHIAVELLI has both a traditional exterior and a revolutionary interior.There is a connection between these two pairs of opposites.As a treatise, the book sets forth a timeless teaching,i.e.,a teaching which is meant to be true for all times;as a tract for the times,it sets forth what ought to be done at a particular time.But the timelessly true teaching is related to time because it is new at the particular time at which it is set forth,and its being new,or not coeval with man, is not accidental.A new teaching concerning the foundations of society being,as such,unacceptable or exposed to enmity,the movement from the accepted or old teaching to the new must be made carefully,or the revolutionary interior must be carefully protected by a traditional exterior.The twofold relation of the book to the particular time at which it was composed or for which it was composed explains why the preponderance of modern ex- amples has a twofold meaning:modern examples are more immedi- ately relevant for action in contemporary Italy than ancient ex- amples,and a discussion of modern examples is less"presumptuous²1 or offensive than is a discussion of the most exalted ancient examples or of the origins of the established order which are neither present nor near.This must be borne in mind if one wants to understand what Machiavelli means by calling the Prince a "treatise."22 As matters stand,it is necessary to add the remark that,in describing the Prince as the work of a revolutionary,we have used that term in the precise sense:a revolutionary is a man who breaks the law,the law as a whole,in order to replace it by a new law which he believes to be better than the old law. The Prince is obviously a combination of a treatise and a tract for the times.But the manner in which that combination is achieved is not obvious:the last chapter does come as a surprise. We believe that this difficulty can be resolved if one does not forget that the Prince also combines a traditional surface with a revolutionar y center. As a treatise,the Prince conveys a general teaching;as a tract for the times,it conveys a particular counsel. The general teaching cannot be identical,but it must at least be compatible,with the particular counsel.There may even be a connection between the general and the particular which is closer than mere compatibility:the general teaching may necessitate the particular counsel,given the particular circumstances in which the immediate addressee of the Prince finds himself,and the par- MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》63《 ticular counsel may require the general teaching of the Prince and be incompatible with any other general teaching.At any rate,in studying the general teaching of the Prince we must never lose sight of the particular situation in which Lorenzo finds himself.We must understand the general in the light of the particular.We must translate every general rule which is addressed generally to princes, or a kind of prince,into a particular counsel addressed to Lorenzo. And conversely,we must work our way upward from the par- ticular counsel which is given in the last chapter to its general premises.Perhaps the complete general premises differ from the general premises as explicitly stated,and the complete particular counsel differs from the particular counsel as explicitly stated. Perhaps the unstated implications,general or particular,provide the link between the general teaching as explicitly stated and the particular counsel as explicitly stated. What precisely is the difficulty created by the counsel given in the last chapter of the Prince?As for the mere fact that that chapter comes as a surprise of some kind,one might rightly say that in the Prince no surprise ought to be surprising.In the light of the indications given in the first chapter,chapters 8-II come as a surprise,to say nothing of other surprises.Besides,one merely has to read the Prince with ordinary care,in order to see that the call to liberate Italy with which the book ends is the natural conclusion of the book.For instance,in chapter I2 Machiavelli says that the outcome of the Italian military system has been that "Italy has been overrun by Charles,plundered by Louis,violated by Ferdinand,and insulted by the Swiss,"or that Italy has be- come“enslaved and insulted.”23 What other conclusion can be drawn from this state of things than that one must bend every effort to liberate Italy after having effected a complete reform of her military system,i.e.,that one ought to do what the last chapter says Lorenzo ought to do?The last chapter presents a problem not because it is a call to liberate Italy but because it is silent as to the difficulties obstructing the liberation of Italy.In that chap- ter it is said more than once that the action recommended to Lorenzo,or urged upon him,will not be"very difficult":almost everything has been done by God;only the rest remains to be done by the human liberator.The chapter creates the impression that the only things required for the liberation of Italy are the 》6 4《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI Italians'strong loathing of foreign domination,and their ancient valor;the liberator of Italy can expect spontaneous cooperation from all his compatriots and he can expect that they will all fly to arms against the foreigners once he“takes the banner.”It is true that Machiavelli stresses even here the need for a radical re- form of the Italian military system.In fact,he devotes the whole center of the chapter,i.e.,almost half of the chapter,to the military conditions for the liberation of Italy.But all the more striking is his complete silence as to its political conditions.What would be gained by all Italians becoming the best soldiers in the world if they were to turn their skill and prowess against one another or, in other words,if there were not first established a strict unity of command,to say nothing of unity of training?It is absurd to say that Machiavelli's patriotic fervor temporarily blinds him to the hard practical problems:his patriotic fervor does not prevent him from speaking in the last chapter very prosaically and even technically about the military preparation.The liberator of Italy is described as a new prince,for the liberation of Italy presupposes the introduction of new laws and new orders:he must do for Italy what Moses did for the people of Israel.But,as Machiavelli had been at pains to point out in the earlier chapters of the book, the new prince necessarily offends many of his fellow countrymen, especially those who benefit from the customary order of things, and his adherents are necessarily unreliable.In the last chapter he is silent on the subject of the inevitable offensiveness of the lib- erator's actions,as well as concerning the powerful resistances which he must expect.The liberator of Italy is urged there to furnish himself with his own troops who will be all the better if they see themselves commanded by their own prince:will the Venetian or the Milanese troops regard the Florentine Lorenzo as their own prince?Machiavelli does not say a word about the difficulties which might be created for the liberator by the various Italian republics and princes.He merely alludes to those difficulties by raising the rhetorical question,"what envy will oppose itself to him?"and by speaking once of"the weakness of the chiefs"in Italy.Does he mean to say that the patriotic fervor of the Italian people will suffice for sweeping aside those weak chiefs,however envious they might be?He certainly implies that before the lib- erator can liberate Italy,he would have to take not merely a MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》65《 banner,as is said in the text of the chapter,but Italy herself,as is said in the heading.It is a rare if not unique case in Machiavelli's books that the heading of a chapter should be more informative than its body. Apart from chapters 26 and 24,the headings of which refer us to contemporary Italy,only one chapter heading in the Prince contains proper names and thus draws our attention to the particu- lar.Chapte r 4 is entitled:“Why the Kingdom of Darius which Alexander had seized did not rebel against Alexander's successors after his death."24 As a consequence,the place of the chapter within the plan of the general teaching as indicated in chapter I, is not immediately clear. Chapter 4 is the central one of three chapters which deal with"mixed principalities,"i.e.,with the acquisition of new territory by princes or republics,or,in other words,with conquest.The primary example in chapter 3 is the policy of conquest practiced by King Louis XII of France;but the country in which he tried to acquire new territory was Italy.In chapter 3,Machiavelli discusses the difficulties obstructing foreign conquests in Italy,a subject most important to the liberator of Italy.By discussing the mistakes which the French king committed in attempting to make lasting conquests in Italy,Machiavelli un- doubtedly gives advice to foreigners contemplating conquest in his own fatherland.25 This might seem to cast a reflection on his patriotism.But one might justly say that such advice is only the reverse side,if the odious side,of advice as to how to defend Italy against foreign domination,or how to liberate Italy.It appears from Machiavelli's discussion that but for certain grave mistakes committed by the French king,he could easily have kept his Italian conquests.The French king committed the grave mistakes of permitting the minor Italian powers to be destroyed and of strengthening a major Italian power,instead of protecting the minor Italian powers and humiliating that major power.We are forced to wonder what conclusion the liberator of Italy would have to draw from these observations.Should he destroy the minor Italian powers and strengthen the major Italian powers?The destruction of the minor powers which Machiavelli has in mind was effected by Cesare Borgia whose actions he holds up as models for Lorenzo. But would not the strengthening of the other major Italian powers perpetuate, and even increase,the difficulties of 》66《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI keeping the foreigner out of Italy?It is this question which is taken up in an oblique way in chapter 4.Machiavelli there dis- tinguishes two kinds of principality:one like the Persia conquered by Alexander the Great,in which one man is prince and all others are slaves,and another kind,like France,which is ruled by a king and barons,i.e.,in which powers exist that are not simply dependent on the prince but rule in their own right.He makes this distinction more general by comparing the French monarchy to Greece prior to the Roman conquest.What he is concerned with is then the difference between countries ruled by a single gov- ernment from which all political authority within the country is simply derived,and countries in which there exists a number of regional or local powers,each ruling in its own right.Seen in the light of this distinction,Italy belongs to the same kind of country as France.In discussing Alexander's conquest of Persia, Machiavelli is compelled to discuss the conquest of a country of the opposite kind,i.e.,the conquest of France.This,however,means that he is enabled to continue surreptitiously the discussion,begun in the preceding chapter,of the conquest of Italy.28 Chapter 4 supplies this lesson:while it is difficult to conquer Persia,it is easy to keep her;conversely,while it is easy to conquer France, it is difficult to keep her. Franc e(for which we may substitute in this context Italy)is easy to conquer because there will always be a discontented baron(state)that will be anxious to receive foreign help against the king(against other states within the country).She is difficult to keep because the old local or regional loyalties will always reassert themselves against the new prince. Secure possession of the country is impossible as long as the ancient blood of the local or regional lords or dukes or princes has not been extinguished.One might think for a moment that what is good for the foreign conqueror of a country of the kind under discussion is not necessarily good for the native liberator of such a country.But,as Machiavelli indicates in chapter 3,the superiority of France to Italy in strength and unity is due to the extirpation of the princely lines of Burgundy,Brittany,Gascony and Normandy. Given the urgency arising from foreign domination of Italy,the liberator cannot afford to wait until the other princely families have become extinct in the course of centuries.He will have to do on the largest scale what Cesare Borgia had done on a small MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》67《 scale:27 in order to uproot the power of the old local and regional loyalties which are a major source of Italian weakness,one must extinguish the families of the obnoxious Italian princes.Cesare Borgia performs a crucial function in the Prince for the additional reason that he is the link between the foreign conqueror of Italy and her native,patriotic liberator:since he was not simply an Italian,he could not well be regarded as a potential liberator of his fatherland.28As for the Italian republics,we learn from chapter 5,the last chapter devoted to the subject of conquest,that the only way in which a prince, or a republic,can be sure of the loyalty of a conquered republican city with an old tradition of autonomy is to ruin it,and to disperse its inhabitants,and that this holds true regardless of whether the conqueror and the con- quered are sons of the same country or not.29 The information regarding the political prerequisites of the liberation of Italy is withheld in the chapter which is explicitly devoted to the liberation of Italy because Machiavelli desired to keep the noble and shining end untarnished by the base and dark means that are indispensable for its achievement.He desired this because the teaching that"the end justifies the means"is repulsive, and he wanted the Prince to end even more attractively than it began.The information withheld in the last chapter is supplied in the section on conquest.To that section above all others we must turn if we desire to know what kinds of resistance on the part of his countrymen the liberator of Italy will have to overcome, and what kinds of offense against his fellow countrymen he will have to commit.To liberate Italy from the barbarians means to unify Italy,and to unify Italy means to conquer Italy.It means to do in Italy something much more difficult than what Ferdinand of Aragon had done in Spain,but in certain respects comparable to it.30 The liberator of Italy cannot depend on the spontaneous fol- lowing of all inhabitants of Italy.He must pursue a policy of iron and poison,of murder and treachery.He must not shrink from the extermination of Italian princely families and the destruction of Italian republican cities whenever actions of this kind are con- ducive to his end.The liberation of Italy means a complete revo- lution.It requires first and above everything else a revolution in thinking about right and wrong.Italians have to learn that the patriotic end hallows every means however much condemned by 2》68《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI the most exalted traditions both philosophic and religious.The twenty-sixth chapter of the Discourses, which has already supplied us with more than one key to the Prince, confirms our present con- clusion.Its heading says:“A new prince,in a city or country taken by him must make everything new.”From its text we learn that just as Cesare Borgia did not become master of the Romagna except by“cruelty well used,”Philip of Macedon did not become within a short time “prince of Greece”except by the use of means which were inimical not only to every humane manner of life but to every Christian manner of life as well.31 The major Italian power which the would-be foreign conqueror, Louis XII,mistakenly strengthened instead of humiliating,was the Church.The native liberator of Italy on the other hand,is advised to use his family connection with the then Pope Leo X in order to receive support for his patriotic enterprise from the already greatly strengthened Church.He is advised,in other words,to use the Church ruled by Leo X as Cesare Borgia,the model,had used the Church ruled by Alexander VI.But this counsel can be of only a provisional character.To see this,one has to consider Machia- velli's reflections on Cesare's successes and failures.Cesare's suc- cusses ultimately benefited only the Church,and thus increased the obstacles to the conquest or liberation of Italy.Cesare was a mere tool of Alexander VI and hence,whatever Alexander's wishes may have been,a mere tool of the papacy.Ultimately,Alexander rather than Cesare represents the contemporary Italian model of a new prince.For Cesare's power was based on the power of the papacy. That power failed him when Alexander died.Cesare's failure was not accidental,considering that the average length of a Pope's reign is ten years,that the influence of any Italian prince on the election of a new Pope is not likely to be greater than that of the great foreign powers and,above all,considering that the Church has a purpose or interest of its own which casts discredit on and thus endangers the use of the power of the Church for purposes other than strengthening the Church.82 The liberation of Italy which re- quires the unification of Italy eventually requires therefore the secu- larization of the Papal states.It requires even more.According to Machiavelli,the Church is not only through its temporal power the chief obstacle to the unity of Italy;the Church is also responsible for the religious and moral corruption of Italy and for the ensuing loss MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》69《 of political virtue.In addition,Machiavelli was very much in fear of the Swiss,whose military excellence he traced partly to their sturdy piety.He draws the conclusion that if the Papal Court were removed to Switzerland,one would soon observe the deterioration of Swiss piety and morals and hence of Swiss power.33 He seemed to have played with the thought that the liberator of Italy would have to go beyond secularizing the Papal states;he might have to remove the Papal Court to Switzerland and thus kill two birds with one stone.The liberator of Italy must certainly have the courage to do what Giovampagolo Baglioni was too vile to do,namely,"to show the prelates how little one ought to respect people who live and rule as they do and thus to perform an action whose greatness obliterates every infamy and every danger that might arise from it.” He must make Italy as united as she was "in the time of the Ro- mans.34 The addressee of the Prince is advised to imitate Romulus among others.To imitate Romulus means to found Rome again. But Rome exists.Or could the imitation of Romulus mean to found again a pagan Rome,a Rome destined to become again the most glorious republic and the seminary and the heart of the most glori- ous empire?Machiavelli does not answer this question in so many words.When he mentions for the second time,in the last chapter of the Prince,the venerable models whom the addressee of the Prince should imitate,he is silent about Romulus.35 The question which he forces us to raise,he answers by silence.In this connection we may note that,whereas in the Discourses"We"sometimes means“We Christians,”“We” never has this meaning in the Prince. At any rate,both the explicit general teaching and the explicit particular counsel conveyed by the Prince are more traditional or less revolutionary than both the complete general teaching and the complete particular counsel.The two pairs of opposites which are characteristic of the Prince,namely,its being both a treatise and a tract for the times and its having both a traditional exterior and a revolutionary center,are nicely interwoven.The Prince is alto- gether,as Machiavelli indicates at the beginning of the second chapter,a fine web.The subtlety of the web contrasts with the shocking frankness of speech which he sometimes employs or affects. It would be better to say that the subtle web is subtly interwoven with the shocking frankness of speech which he chooses to employ at the proper time and in the proper place. 》70《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI So much for the present regarding the character of the Prince. The subject of the book is the prince but especially the new prince. In the Epistle Dedicatory,Machiavelli indicates that his teaching is based upon his knowledge of the actions of great men;but the greatest examples of great men are new princes like Moses,Cyrus, Romulus and Theseus,men "who have acquired or founded king- doms."In the first chapter,he divides principalities into classes with a view to the differences of materials and modes of acquisition rather than to differences of structure and purpose.He thus indi- cates from the outset that he is chiefly concerned with men who desire to acquire principalities(either mixed or wholly new),i.e., with new princes.There is a twofold reason for this emphasis.The obvious reason is the fact that the immediate addressee of the book is a new prince,and one who is,moreover,advised to become prince of Italy and thus to become a new prince in a more exalted sense.But what at first glance seems to be dictated merely by Machiavelli's consideration for the needs and prospects of his imme- diate addressee proves,on reflection,to be necessary for purely theoretical reasons as well.All principalities,even if they are now elective or hereditary,were originally new principalities.Even all republics,at least the greatest republics,were founded by outstand- ing men wielding extraordinary power,i.e.,by new princes.To discuss new princes means then to discuss the origins or foundations of all states or of all social orders,and therewith the nature of society.The fact that the addressee of the Prince is an actual or potential new prince somewhat conceals the eminent theoretical significance of the theme "the new prince." The ambiguity due to the fact that the Prince sometimes deals with princes in general and sometimes with new princes in par- ticular is increased by the ambiguity of the term “new prince.”The term may designate the founder of a dynasty in a state already established,i.e.,a new prince in an old state,or a man who "seizes" a state,like Sforza in Milan or Agathocles in Syracuse or Liverotto in Fermo.But it may also designate a new prince in a new state or “a wholly new prince in a wholly new state,”i.e.,a man who has not merely acquired a state already in existence but has founded a state.The new prince in a new state in his turn may be an imitator, i.e.,adopt modes and orders invented by another new prince,or in other ways follow the beaten track.But he may also be the 》72 《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI to Cyrus and to Theseus.Lorenzo is then exhorted to imitate Moses. The notion of imitating the prophets of old was familiar to Machiavelli's contemporaries:Savonarola appeared as a new Amos or as a new Moses,i.e.,as a man who did the same things which the Biblical prophets had done,in new circumstances.This is not to say that there is no difference between the imitation of Moses as Savonarola meant it and the imitation of Moses as Machi- avelli understood it.In order to encourage Lorenzo to liberate Italy,Machiavelli reminds him of the miracles which God had performed before their eyes:"The sea has been divided.A cloud has guided you on your way.The rock has given forth water. Manna has rained.”The miracles of Lorenzo's time which indeed are attested to by Machiavelli alone,imitate the miracles of Moses' time.More precisely,they imitate the miracles which were per- formed,not in Egypt,the house of bondage,but on the way from Egypt to the promised land-to a land to be conquered.Differing from Savonarola,Machiavelli does not predict that Florence,or her ruler,will become the ruler of Italy,39 for the success of the venture now depends alone on the exercise of human virtue which, because of man's free-will,cannot be foreseen.What may be imminent,Machiavelli suggests,is the conquest of another promised land,the land which Machiavelli has half-promised to Lorenzo. But alas,the imitation of Moses is bad for Lorenzo;for Moses did not conquer the promised land:he died at its borders.In this dark way,Machiavelli,the new sibyl,prophesies that Lorenzo will not conquer and liberate Italy.40 He did not regard the practical proposal with which he concluded the Prince as prac- ticable.He had measured the forces of contemporary Italy too well to have any delusions.As he states in the two Prefaces of the companion book,which in this respect takes up the thread where the Prince drops it,"of that ancient virtue [which is political]no trace has been left"in Italy.Not the short range project suggested at the end of the Prince,but rather the long range project indicated throughout the Discourses offers hope for success.Many writers have dismissed the last chapter of the Prince as a piece of mere rhetoric.This assertion-if it were followed up by an intelligent account of the enigmatic conclusion of the Prince-could be accepted as a crude expression of the fact that that chapter must not be taken literally or too seriously. MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》73《 Machiavelli is not content with indicating his opinion by leading us to think of the inauspicious character of the imitation of Moses in respect of the conquest of a promised land.While stressing the imitative character of the work to which he exhorts Lorenzo,he stresses the fact that the liberator of Italy must be an originator,an inventor of new modes and orders,hence not an imitator.He himself hints at some far-reaching tactical innovations. But it is clear that the innovator or the inventor in these matters would be Machiavelli,not Lorenzo.The cryptic prediction of Lorenzo's failure,if he were to attempt to liberate Italy,can therefore be restated as follows:only a man of genius,of supreme virtue,could possibly succeed in liberating Italy;but Lorenzo lacks the highest form of virtue.This being the case,he is com- pelled to rely too much on chance.Machiavelli indicates and conceals how much Lorenzo would have to rely on chance by the religious language which he employs in the last chapter.He mentions God as often there as in all other chapters of the Prince taken together.He refers to the liberator of Italy as an Italian "spirit";he describes the liberation of Italy as a divine redemption and he suggests its resemblance to the resurrection of the dead as depicted by Ezekiel;he alludes to the miracles wrought by God in Italy.However much we might wish to be moved by these expressions of religious sentiment,we fail in our effort. Machiavelli's certainty of divine intervention reminds us of his expectation of a spontaneous all-Italian rising against the hated foreigners.Just as that expectation is at variance with what earlier chapters had indicated as to the certainty of powerful Italian resistance to the liberator and unifier of Italy,so the expression of religious sentiment is at variance with earlier explicit remarks. According to those remarks,fear of God is desirable or indis- pensable in soldiers and perhaps in subjects in general,while the prince need merely appear religious,and he can easily create that appearance considering the crudity of the large majority of men.In the last chapter itself,Machiavelli calls the God-wrought con- temporary events which resemble certain Biblical miracles not “miracles”but “extraordinary"” events "without example”41:he thus denies the reality of those Biblical miracles and therewith, for an obvious reason,the reality of all Biblical miracles.Without such a denial,his own free invention of the contemporary“extraor- 》74《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI dinary”events would not have been possible:those invented miracles have the same status as the Biblical miracles.According to the Prince,miracles are happenings which are neither common nor reasonable.They are happenings that cannot be traced to secondary causes but only to God directly.Near the beginning of chapter 25 Machiavelli suggests that what is generally meant by God is in truth nothing but chance.Hence the suggestion made in chapter 26,that a number of miracles had happened in contemporary Italy is the figurative equivalent of the assertion, made explicitly in chapter 25,that chance is particularly powerful in contemporary Italy.More specifically,many“miraculous losses” have been sustained in contemporary Italy.2 In the last chapter Machiavelli enumerates seven astonishing defeats suffered in the immediate past by Italian troops.43 Since there is no defeat without a victor,one may speak with equal right of "miraculous losses and miraculous acquisitions"being the necessary consequence of the preponderance of Fortuna's power in contemporary Italy.44 This means that,given the poverty of the Italian military system and the ensuing preponderance of chance,a well advised and industrious prince might have astounding temporary successes against other Italian princes,just as Pope Julius II had such successes against his cowardly enemies.In particular,Lorenzo might succeed in building up a strong power in Tuscany.But the thought of defeating the powerful military monarchies which dominate parts of Italy remains for the time being a dream.45 One cannot understand the meaning of the last chapter,and therewith of the Prince as a whole,without taking into considera- tion the position,the character and the aspirations of the other partner in the relationship,not to say in the dialogue,which is constitutive of the book.In proportion as the status of Lorenzo is lessened,the stature of Machiavelli grows.At the beginning, in the Epistle Dedicatory,Lorenzo appears as dwelling on the wholesome heights of majesty whereas Machiavelli must inhale the dust at his feet:the favorite of Fortuna is contrasted with her enemy.Machiavelli presents himself as a man who possesses informa- tion which princes necessarily lack and yet need.He describes that information in a way which is surprising not only to those who are forced by disposition or training to think of statistical data.He claims to possess knowledge of the nature of princes: MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》75《 just as one sees mountains best from a valley and valleys best from a mountain,so one must be a prince in order to know well the nature of peoples,and one must be a man of the people in order to know well the nature of princes.In other words,while Lorenzo and Machiavelli are at opposite ends of the scale of Fortuna,they are equal in wisdom:each possesses one half of the whole of political wisdom;they are born to supplement each other.Machi- avelli does not say that they should pool their resources in order to liberate Italy.Nor does he wish to hand over his share of political wisdom to Lorenzo as a pure gift.He desires to receive something in return.He desires to better his fortune.Looking forward to the end of the book,we may say that he desires to better his fortune by showing Lorenzo how to better his fortune through becoming prince of Italy.For,as he says already in the Epistle Dedicatory,chance and Lorenzo's other qualities promise him a greatness which even surpasses his present great- ness.He dedicates the Prince to Lorenzo because he seeks honorable employment.He desires to become the servant of Lorenzo.Perhaps he desires to become an occasional or temporary adviser to Lorenzo.Perhaps he is even thinking of the position of a permanent adviser.But the absolute limit of his ambition would be to become the minister of Lorenzo,to be to Lorenzo what Antonio da Venafro had been to Pandolfo Petrucci,prince of Siena.His desire would be wholly unreasonable if he did not see his way toward convincing his master of his competence.The proof of his competence is the Prince. But competence is not enough.Lorenzo must also be assured of Machiavelli's loyalty or at least reliability.Machiavelli cannot refer,not even in the Epistle Dedicatory,to the fact that he had once had honorable employment in which he served loyally.For he was a loyal servant of the republican regime in Florence,and this by itself might compromise him in the eyes of his prince.He faces this difficulty for the first time in the chapter on civil principalities,i.e.,on the kind of principality of which Lorenzo's rule is an example.He discusses there the question of how the prince ought to treat the notables among his subjects. He distinguishes three kinds of notables,the central one consisting of men who do not commit themselves entirely to the cause of the prince because they are pusillanimous and have a natural defect of courage.Machiavelli advises the prince to employ men 》76《 THOUGHTSON MACHIAVELLI of this kind provided they are men of good counsel,"for in prosperity you are honored on account of this and in adversity you have nothing to fear from them."Men of good counsel will have the required pusillanimity if the power of the prince has strong popular support:the few who can see with their own eyes “do not dare to oppose themselves to the opinion of the many who have the majesty of the state on their side."Since Machiavelli was suspected of having participated in a conspiracy against the Medici,it was particularly necessary for him to show through the Prince that men of his kind would never have the temerity to engage in such dangerous undertakings for they would think only of the probable outcome of the deed and not of its possible intrinsic nobility.He almost presents the spectacle of a conversa- tion between himself and a potential conspirator against the prince in which he tries to convince the conspirator of the folly of his imaginings-a spectacle the very suggestion of which must have edified and reassured Lorenzo should he have read the Prince. Eventually,Machiavelli does not refrain from speaking explicitly about how a new prince should treat men who in the beginning of his reign had been suspect because of their loyalty to the preceding regime.He urges the prince to employ men of this kind. “Pandolfo Petrucci,prince of Siena,ruled his state more with those who were suspected by him than with others.”Th e mere fact that such men are compelled to live down a past makes them willing to be reliable servants of the prince.But by proving so completely his reliability in addition to his competence,Machiavelli might seem to have overshot the mark.His potential employer might well wonder whether a man of Machiavelli's cleverness, if employed as an adviser or minister,would not receive all credit for wise actions of the government and thus by contrast render the less wise prince rather contemptible.Machiavelli reassures him, as well as he can,by setting up the infallible general rule that a prince who is not himself wise cannot be well advised.46 Con- sidering the great hazards to which Machiavelli exposes himself by trying to enter the service of a new prince,one may wonder whether according to his principles he ought not to have preferred poverty and obscurity.He answers this question in the Discourses since it cannot be answered with propriety in the Prince.Men in his position,he indicates,live in continuous danger if they do MACHLAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》77《 not seek employment with the prince;in trying to give advice to the prince,they must indeed “take things moderately,”ie.,they must avoid standing forth as the chief or sole promoters of a bold scheme.Only if the bold scheme is backed by a strong party can some risks be safely taken.47 The particular counsel which Machiavelli gives to Lorenzo explicitly,i.e.,the counsel which he gives in the last chapter of the Prince,is moderate both because it is silent concerning the extreme measures required for the liberation of Italy and because it cannot but be very popular with very many Italians. We have not yet considered Machiavelli's strange suggestion that he possesses one half of political wisdom,namely,knowledge of the nature of princes,whereas Lorenzo may possess the other half,namely,knowledge of the nature of peoples.He makes this suggestion in the same context in which he declares his intention of giving rules for princely government.But to give rules to princes as to how they ought to rule,means to teach them how they ought to rule their peoples.Machiavelli cannot then teach princes without possessing good knowledge of the nature of peoples as well.In fact,he gives much evidence of his possessing such knowledge inasmuch as he transmits it in the Prince to his princel y pupil.He knows then everything of relevance that the prince knows,and in addition he knows much that is relevant of which the prince is ignorant.He is not merely a potential adviser of a prince but a teacher of princes as such.In fact,since more than one of his precepts is not required for princes at all, because princes would know such things without his instruction, he also,through the Prince,teaches subjects what they should expect from their prince,or the truth about the nature of princes.48 As an adviser of a prince,he addresses an individual;as a teacher of political wisdom,he addresses an indefinite multitude.He indicates his dual capacity and the corresponding duality of his addressees by his use of the second person of the personal pronoun: he uses “Thou” when addressing the prince,and even the man who conspires against the prince,i.e.,when addressing men of action,while he uses“You”when addressing those whose interest is primarily theoretical,either simply or for the time being.The latte r kind of addressees of the Prince are identical with the addressees of the Discourses, "t he young."49 》78《 THOUGHTSON MACHIAVELLI Machiavelli mentions only one teacher of princes,namely, Chirori the centaur who brought up Achilles and many other ancient princes.Machiavelli’s own model is a mythical figure: he returns to the beginnings not only by making the heroic founders his most exalted theme and the foundation of society his most fundamental theme,but likewise in understanding his own doing.His model is half beast,half man.He urges princes, and especially new princes,first to make use of both natures,the nature of the beast and the nature of man;and in the repetition, simply to imitate the beast,i.e.,to use the person of the fox and the lion,or to imitate those two natures.50 The imitation of the beast takes the place of the imitation of God.We may note here that Machiavelli is our most important witness to the truth that humanism is not enough.Since man must understand himself in the light of the whole or of the origin of the whole which is not human,or since man is the being that must try to transcend humanity,he must transcend humanity in the direction of the subhuman if he does not transcend it in the direction of the superhuman.Tertium ,i.e.,humanism, non datur.We may look forward from Machiavelli to Swift whose greatest work culminates in the recommendation that men should imitate the horses,51 to Rousseau who demanded the return to the state of nature,a sub- human state,and to Nietzsche who suggested that Truth is not God but a Woman.As for Machiavelli,one may say with at least equal right that he replaces the imitation of the God-Man Christ by the imitation of the Beast-Man Chiron.That Beast-Man is,as Machiavelli indicates,a creation of the writers of antiquity, a creature of the imagination.Just as Scipio,in imitating Cyrus, in fact imitated a creation of Xenophon,52 so the princes in imitating Chiron,will in fact imitate,not Chiron,but the ancient writers, if the carrying out of a teaching can justly be called an imitation of that teaching. But whatever may be true of princes or other actors,certainly Machiavelli,by teaching princes what Chiron was said to have taught,imitates Chiron or follows the creators of Chiron.Yet,as we have noted before,merely by teaching openly and in his own name what certain ancient writers had taught covertly and by using their characters as their mouth- pieces,Machiavelli sets forth an entirely new teaching. He is a Chiron of an entirely new kind. MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》79《 As a teacher of princes or of new princes in general,Machiavelli is not especially concerned with the particular problems facing contemporary Italian princes.Those particular problems would be of interest to him only as illustrations of typical problems.The primary purpose of the Prince then is not to give particular counsel to a contemporary Italian prince,but to set forth a wholly new teaching regarding wholly new princes in wholly new states,or a shocking teaching about the most shocking phenomena.From that fact we understand the meaning of the last chapter.The par- ticular counsel there given serves the purpose of justifying the novel general teaching before the tribunal of accepted opinion:a general teaching,however novel and repulsive,might seem to be redeemed if it leads up to a particular counsel as respectable,hon- orable and praiseworthy as that of liberating Italy.But how is this transformation achieved?Machiavelli does not merely suppress mention of the unholy means which are required for the achieve- ment of the sacred end.He surreptitiously introduces a new end, an end not warranted by the argument of the first twenty-five chapters.He urges Lorenzo to liberate Italy on patriotic grounds or,to use a term to which he alludes near the beginning of chapter 26,on grounds of the common good.He thus creates the impres- sion that all the terrible rules and counsels given throughout the work were given exclusively for the sake of the common good. The last chapter suggests then a tolerable interpretation of the shocking teaching of the bulk of the work.But the first twenty- five chapters had observed complete silence regarding the common good.The allusion to the common good near the beginning of chapter 26 has the same status as the other surprising features of that chapter:the expectation of a spontaneous all-Italian rising against the foreigners and the expression of religious sentiment.It is only when one subjects the particular counsel given in the last chapter to political analysis along the lines demanded by the earlier chapters that one realizes that one must have broken completely with traditional morality and traditional beliefs in order even to consider that counsel.But the judicious reader cannot be satisfied with raising the question of how that particular counsel could be put into practice and thereafter whether it can be put into prac- tice under the given circumstances.He must raise this further and more incisive question:would Machiavelli condemn the im- 》 80《 THOUGHTSON MACHIAVELLI moral policies recommended in the bulk of the book if they did not serve a patriotic purpose?Or are those immoral policies barely compatible with a patriotic use?Is it not possible to understand the patriotic conclusion of the Prince as a respectable coloring of the designs of a self-seeking Italian prince?There can be no doubt regarding the answer;the immoral policies recommended through- out the Prince are not justified on grounds of the common good, but exclusively on grounds of the self-interest of the prince,of his selfish concern with his own well-being,security and glory.53 The final appeal to patriotism supplies Machiavelli with an excuse for having recommended immoral courses of action.In the light of this fact,his character may very well appear to be even blacker than even his worst enemies have thought.At the same time how- ever,we are not forced to leave the matter with the remark that the last chapter of the Prince is a piece of mere rhetoric,i.e.,that he was not capable of thinking clearly and writing with con- summate skill. These observations are not to deny that Machiavelli was an Italian patriot.He would not have been human if he had not loathed the barbarians who were devastating and degrading his fair coun- try.We merely deny that his love for his fatherland,or his father- land itself,was his most precious possession.The core of his being was his thought about man,about the condition of man and about human affairs.By raising the fundamental questions he of necessity transcended the limitations and the limits of Italy, and he thus was enabled to use the patriotic sentiments of his readers,as well as his own,for a higher purpose,for an ulterior purpose.One must also consider an ambiguity characteristic of Machiavelli's patriotism.In the Prince there are eight references to "the fatherland."In one case Italy is described as a fatherland. In six cases the fatherlands mentioned are,not countries,but cities. In one case,four fatherlands are mentioned;two are cities(Rome and Athens)and two are countries;one of the countries is Persia; as regards the other country,the fatherland nobilitated by Moses, it is unclear whether it is Egypt or Canaan,the land of his birth or the land of his aspiration.54 When we apply this observation to Machiavelli,we become aware of a tension between his Italian patriotism and his Florentine patriotism.Or should one not rather speak of a tension between his Roman patriotism and his Tuscan MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》8I《 patriotism?There exists a close connection between the trans- patriotic core of his thought and his love for Italy.Italy is the soil out of which sprang the glory that was ancient Rome.Machia- velli believed that the men who are born in a country preserve through all ages more or less the same nature.If the greatest political achievement which the world has ever known was a fruit of the Italian soil there is ground for hope that the political rejuvenation of the world will make its first appearance in Italy: the sons of Italy are the most gifted individuals;all modern writers referred to in either the Prince or the Discourses are Ital- ians. Since that political rejuvenation is bound up with a radical change in thought,the hope from Italy and for Italy is not pri- marily political in the narrow sense.The liberation of Italy which Machiavelli has primarily in mind is not the political liberation of Italy from the barbarians but the intellectual liberation of an Italian elite from a bad tradition.But precisely because he believed that the men who are born in a country preserve through all ages more or less the same nature,and as the nature of the Romans was dif- ferent from that of the Tuscans,his hope was also grounded on his recollection of Tuscan glory:55 the old Etrurians had made a decisive contribution to the religion of the Romans.He seems to have regarded himself as a restorer of Tuscan glory because he too contributed toward supplying Rome with a new religion or with a new outlook on religion.Or perhaps he thought of Tar- quinius Priscus who,coming from Etruria,strengthened the demo- cratic element of the Roman polity. Furthermore,once one grasps the intransigent character of Machiavelli's theoretical concern,one is no longer compelled to burden him with the full responsibility for that practical reck- lessness which he frequently recommends.The ruthless counsels given throughout the Prince are addressed less to princes,who would hardly need them,than to “the young”who are concerned with understanding the nature of society.Those true addressees of the Prince have been brought up in teachings which,in the light of Machiavelli's wholly new teaching,reveal themselves to be much too confident of human goodness,if not of the goodness of creation,and hence too gentle or effeminate.Just as a man who is timorous by training or nature cannot acquire courage,which is the mean between cowardice and foolhardiness,unless he drags 》82《 THOUGHTSON MACHIAVELLI himself in the direction of foolhardiness,so Machiavelli's pupils must go through a process of brutalization in order to be freed from effeminacy.Or just as one learns bayoneting by using weapons which are much heavier than those used in actual combat,5⁶one learns statecraft by seriously playing with extreme courses of ac- tion which are rarely,if ever,appropriate in actual politics.Not only some of the most comforting,but precisely some of the most outrageous statements of the Prince are not meant seriously but serve a merely pedagogic function:as soon as one understands them,one sees that they are amusing and meant to amuse.Machia- velli tries to divert the adherence of the young from the old to the new teaching by appealing to the taste of the young which is not the best taste or,for that matter,to the taste of the common people:57 he displays a bias in favor of the impetuous,the quick, the partisan,the spectacular,and the bloody over and against the deliberate,the slow,the neutral,the silent,and the gentle.In the Prince he says that a prince who has conquered a city which was wont to live free must destroy that city if he cannot make it his residence.In the Discourses he says that precisely a prince (if he is not a barbarian)as distinguished from a republic would spare and protect conquered cities and would leave their autonomy intact,as much as possible.58 Another resolute course of action recommended in the Prince is to avoid neutrality when two power- ful neighbors come to blows:to take sides is always better than to remain neutral.Machiavelli gradually discloses the limitations of this advice.He admits first that neutrality is not always fatal. He then states that because of the power of justice,to take sides is safer than to remain neutral.Thereafter he makes clear that under certain conditions it is most unwise to abandon neutrality in case of conflict between two powerful neighbors.Finally he admits that no course of action is perfectly safe or,in other words, that the power of justice is not as great as he previously indicated.59 He suggests very strongly in the Prince that the one thing needful is good arms;he speaks less loudly of the need for prudence.60 We must return once more to Machiavelli's suggestion that he possesses adequate knowledge of the nature of princes,whereas Lorenzo may possess adequate knowledge of the nature of peoples. As we have said,this suggestion is absurd:since to be a prince means to rule the people,it is impossible to know princes well without knowing peoples well;to say nothing of the facts that MACHIAVELLI's INTENTION:The Prince 》83《 Machiavelli displays knowledge of the nature of peoples through- out the Prince and,as he says explicitly in the Discourses,there is no difference of nature between princes and peoples.61 Since he knows well the nature of peoples,he intimates by his strange suggestion that he is a prince.This intimation will appear strange only to those who lack familiarity with Xenophon or Plato:he who knows the art of ruling is more truly a ruler than men who rule merely by virtue of inheritance or force or fraud or election by people who know nothing of the art of ruling.62 But if Machiavelli is a prince,he is a new prince and not one who imi- tates the modes and orders found by others,but rather an origi- nator,a true founder,a discoverer of new modes and orders,a man of supreme virtue.In fact,if it is proper to call prophet the founder of a new social order which is all-comprehensive and not merely political or military,then Machiavelli is a prophet.Not Lorenzo,but Machiavelli is the new Romulus-Numa or the new Moses,i.e.,a man who does not merely repeat in new circum- stances what Romulus-Numa or Moses had done in the olden times,but who is as original as they were.In the last chapter of the Prince,he attests to certain miracles which had happened somewhere in contemporary Italy-miracles which resemble those of the time of Moses.The ancient miracles happened on the way from the house of bondage to the promised land:they happened immediately before the revelation on Mount Sinai.What is immi- nent, Machiavelli suggests then,is not the conquest of a new promised land,but a new revelation,the revelation of a new code, of a new decalogue.The man who will bring the new code, cannot be Lorenzo or any other prince in the vulgar sense.The bringer of the new code is none other than Machiavelli himself: he brings the true code,the code which is in accordance with the truth,with the nature of things.Compared with this achieve- ment,the conquest of the promised land,the liberation of Italy, is a cura posterior: it can wait,it must wait until the new code has regenerated the Italians.The new Moses will not be sad if he dies at the borders of the land which he had promised,and if he will see it only from afar.For while it is fatal for a would-be conqueror not to conquer while he is alive,the discoverer of the all-important truth can conquer posthumously.63 Concerning prophets in general,Machiavell i remarks that all 》84《 THOUGHTS ON MACHIAVELLI armed prophets have conquered and the unarned prophets have failed.The greatest armed prophet is Moses.The only unamned prophet mentioned is Savonarola.But as is shown by the expres- sion"all armed prophets...and the unarmed ones,"he thinks not only of Savonarola.Just as he,who admired so greatly the contemporary Muslim conquerors,could not help thinking of Muhammad when speaking of armed prophets,so he must have thought of Jesus when speaking of unarmed prophets.This is per- haps the greatest difficulty which we encounter when we try to enter into the thought of the Prince:how can Machiavelli,on the basis of his principles,account for the victory of Christianicy? Certain of his successors attempted explicitly to explain the victory of Christianity in purely political terms.To quote from a present- day historian:"In the most starkly Erastian utterance of the [seventeenth]century,[Henry]Parker all but maintained that it was Constantine,and not the preaching or the miracles of the early Church,that won Europe to the Christian fold."64 But we cannot bring ourselves to believe that a man of Machiavelli's in- telligence would have been satisfied with an answer of this kind, which merely leads to this further question:what motivated Con- stantine's action?must Christianity not already have been a power in order to become an attraction or a tool for a politician?To see how Machiavelli could have accounted for the victory of Christianity,we have to consider a further difficulty which is no less obvious.All unarmed prophets,he says,have failed.But what is he himself if not an unarmed prophet?How can he reasonably hope for the success of his enormous venture-enormous in itself and productive of infinite enormities-if unanmed prophers neces- sarily fail?This is the only fundamental question which the Prince raises in the reader's mind without giving him even a suspicion of Machiavelli's answer.It reminds one of the question,likewise left unanswered in the Prince,as to how new modes and orders can be maintained throughout the ages.65 For the answer to it,we must turn to the Discourses.