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

Never do an enemy a small injury.

Men seldom rise from low condition to high rank without employing either force or fraud, unless that rank should be attained either by gift or inheritance.

The chief foundations of all states, new as well as old or composite, are good laws and good arms.

A prince must not have any other object nor any other thought… but war, its institutions, and its discipline; because that is the only art befitting one who commands.

When men receive favours from someone they expected to do them ill, they are under a greater obligation to their benefactor.

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.