....those who become princes through their skill acquire the pricipality with difficulty, buy they hold onto it with ease.

Decide which is the line of conduct that presents the fewest drawbacks and then follow it out as being the best one, because one never finds anything perfectly pure and unmixed, or exempt from danger.

Men should be either treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries - for heavy ones they cannot.

I believe that it is possible for one to praise, without concern, any man after he is dead since every reason and supervision for adulation is lacking.

My view is that it is desirable to be both loved and feared; but it is difficult to achieve both and, if one of them has to be lacking, it is much safer to be feared than loved.

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

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