Never lead your soldiers to battle if you have not first confirmed their spirit and known them to be without fear and ordered; and never test them except when you see that they hope to win.

A government which does not trust its citizens to be armed is not itself to be trusted.

The vulgar crowd always is taken by appearances, and the world consists chiefly of the vulgar.

Benefits should be granted little by little, so that they may be better enjoyed.

And what physicians say about disease is applicable here: that at the beginning a disease is easy to cure but difficult to diagnose; but as time passes, not having been recognized or treated at the outset, it becomes easy to diagnose but difficult to cure. The same thing occurs in affairs of state; for by recognizing from afar the diseases that are spreading in the state (which is a gift given only to the prudent ruler), they can be cured quickly; but when, not having been recognized, they are not recognized and are left to grow to the extent that everyone recognizes them, there is no longer any cure.

They have not any difficulties on the way up because they fly, but they have many when they reach the summit.

The unarmed man is not just defenseless - he is also contemptible.