Machiavelli on Grit Quotes

"Severities should be dealt out all at once, so that their suddenness may give less offense."

"One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived."

"The wise man does at once what the fool does finally."

"Nature creates few men who are brave, but training and experience make many."

"Men should either be caressed or crushed, because they can avenge themselves of light injuries, of more serious ones they cannot."

"Hence it comes that all armed prophets have been victorious, and all unarmed prophets have been destroyed."

"It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both."

"There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others."

"Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others."

"It is better to be adventurous than cautious, because fortune is a woman."

"He who is the cause of another becoming powerful is the agent of his own destruction."

"Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied."

"War should be the only study of a prince. He should consider peace only as a breathing-time."

"The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves."

"Fortune is a woman, and if you wish to keep her under it is necessary to beat and ill-use her."

"A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtue of one man."

"It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles."

"Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims."

"The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him."

"He who becomes a Prince through the favor of the people should always keep on good terms with them."

"It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver."

"Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great."

"Men are more apt to be mistaken in their generalizations than in their particular observations."

"Mankind will always be the same and always have the same passions."

"For although the act condemns the doer, the end may justify him."

"Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are."

"The promise given was a necessity of the past: the word broken is a necessity of the present."

"A prince never lacks legitimate reasons to break his promise."

"I believe that the greatest good to be done and the most gratifying to God is that which one does for one’s country."

"A man who is used to acting in one way never changes; he must come to ruin when the times, in changing, no longer are in harmony with his ways."

"Hatred is gained as much by good works as by evil."

"Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times."

"God is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us."