Quotes About Leadership

A wise prince, when he has the opportunity, ought with craft to foster some animosity against himself, so that, having crushed it, his renown may rise higher.

It is so far from how one lives to how one should live that he who lets go of what is done for what should be done learns his ruin rather than his preservation

it often enables men to rise from a private station to that rank.

His actions have arisen in such a way, one out of the other, that men have never been given time to work steadily against him.

The actions of a new prince are more narrowly observed than those of an hereditary one.

As to how a Prince is to know his Minister, this unerring rule may be laid down. When you see a Minister thinking more of himself than of you, and in all his actions seeking his own ends, that man can never be a good Minister or one that you can trust.

Since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to feared than loved.

mantenendosi loro le condizioni vecchie e non vi essendo disformità di costumi, li uomini si vivono quietamente; come s'è visto che ha fatto la Borgogna, la Brettagna, la Guascogna e la Normandia, che tanto tempo sono state con Francia;

It's easy to convince people of something, but hard to keep them convinced.

En nuestros tiempos sólo hemos visto hacer grandes cosas a los hombres considerados tacaños; los demás siempre han fracasado.

Çünkü gerçekten sahiplenebilmek için yak?p y?kmaktan baÅŸka bir çare de yoktur. Ve özgürce yaÅŸamaya al???k bir kenti ele geçiren biri eÄŸer o kenti yak?p y?kmazsa, kendisi o kent taraf?ndan yak?l?p y?k?lmay? bekliyor demektir.

Pero cuando las ciudades o provincias están acostumbradas a vivir bajo un principe, y por la extinción de éste y su linaje queda vacante el gobierno, como por un lado los habitantes estfán habituados a obedecer y por otro no tienen a quién, y no se ponen de acuerdo para elegir a uno de entre ellos, ni saben vivir en libertad, y por último tampoco se deciden a tomar las armas contra el invasor, un principe puede fácilmente conquistarlas y retenerlas.

When the duke occupied the Romagna he found it under the rule of weak masters, who rather plundered their subjects than ruled them, and gave them more cause for disunion than for union, so that the country was full of robbery, quarrels, and every kind of violence; and so, wishing to bring back peace and obedience to authority, he considered it necessary to give it a good governor. Thereupon

Porque las ofensas deben inferirse de una sola vez para que, durando menos, hieran menos; mientras que los beneficios deben proporcionarse poco a poco, a fin de que se saboreen mejor.

Machiavelli was no facile phrasemonger; the conditions under which he wrote

Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin by the great number who are not good.

The prince who holds a country differing in the above respects ought to make himself the head and defender of his less powerful neighbours, and to weaken the more powerful amongst them, taking care that no foreigner as powerful as himself shall, by any accident, get a footing there. And the usual course of affairs is that, as soon as a powerful foreigner enters a country, all the subject states are drawn to him, moved by the hatred which they feel against the ruling power.

you must know that there are two modes of fighting: one in accordance with the laws, the other with force. The first is proper to man, the second to beasts. But because the first, in many cases, is not sufficient, it becomes necessary to have recourse to the second: therefore, a prince must know how to make good use of the natures of both the beast and the man.

It ought to be remembered that 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.

Having Come to Freedom, a Corrupt People Can with the Greatest Difficulty Maintain Itself Free

A prince never lacks legitimate reasons to break his promise.

wish to acquire is in truth very natural and common, and men always do so when they can, and for this they will be praised not blamed; but when they cannot do so, yet wish to do so by any means, then there is folly and blame.

The Prince before its first legal publication in English in 1640

Y el primer juicio que nos formamos sobre la inteligencia de un señor nace de observar a los hombres que le rodean; y cuando son competentes y fieles se le puede considerar siempre sabio, porque ha sabido reconocer su competencia y mantenerlos fieles a él. Pero cuando son de otra manera siempre cabe hacerse de él un juicio que no sea bueno, porque con esa elección comete el primer error.