A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.

Never do your enemy a minor injury.

Thus it is well to seem merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualities.

For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances, as though they were realities, and are often more influenced by the things that seem than by those that are.

....for friendships that are acquired by a price and not by greatness and nobility of character are purchased but are not owned, and at the proper moment they cannot be spent.

Since it is difficult to join them together, it is safer to be feared than to be loved when one of the two must be lacking.

Men in general judge more from appearances than from reality. All men have eyes, but few have the gift of penetration.