The Prince
The only way it was possible to get ahead was to be part of the inner circle. It didn't really matter what the issue was or what sort of implications it carried. All that mattered was knowing the right person, having the right information, making the right introductions, and going to the right parties. The most valuable information was not necessarily something you knew about an enemy but something you knew about a friend. Staff and "advisors" were, in many ways, far more powerful than the aristocrat holding office. As much as it sounds like it, it was not late 20th century Washington, D.C. but early 16th century Italy. The tell all book is not "Primary Colors," "And the Horse He Rode In," or any other modern political tell-all but the most infamous political book of all time, "The Prince" by Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527). Machiavelli entered government service as a clerk and rose to prominence when the Florentine Republic was proclaimed in 1498. His duties included missions to the French king (1504, 1510-11), the Holy See (1506), and the German emperor (1507-8). In the course of his diplomatic missions within Italy he became acquainted with many of the Italian rulers and was able to study their political tactics, p
There are, of course, lasting qualities of The Prince that have proven to transcend time and place. Without regard to its historic application, The Prince still remains a great work. The theory of human behavior that Machiavelli presents, which even if not acceptable by the prevailing morality of the time or even of the modern world, still deserves respect. The premises he put forth and the attitudes he suggested were to change the view of the aristocracy by the general populace and vice versa forever. If one accepts his belief that man is essentially corrupt (which is not especially different from Church dogma), and if one believes that man will not be called upon to answer for his sins in the afterlife, leaving him free to pursue worldly goals, then The Prince presents an extremely logical world. It is an attempt to deal with the world as it is, and not as it should be. Machiavelli never describes any of his theories as utopian; his theories are simply a guide to survival in the cutthroat political climate of the time. Machiavelli is not interested in reforming human nature, but rather in using it to serve his own ends. articularly those of Cesare Borgia, who was at that time engaged in enlarging his holdings in central Italy. From 1503 to 1506 Machiavelli reorganized the military defense of the republic of Florence. Machiavelli spent the great majority of his political and governmental career attempting to establish a state that would be fully able to resist any sort of foreign attack. All of his thought and all of his writing revolves around the means by which a state is created and maintained. In his most famous work, The Prince, he describes the method by which a prince can acquire and maintain political power. This study, which has often been regarded as a defense of the authoritarianism and tyranny of such rulers as Cesare Borgia, is based on Machiavelli's belief that a ruler is not bound by traditional ethical norms. In his view, a prince should be concern
Some common words found in the essay are:
Italy French, Cesare Borgia, Medici Florentine, Duke Milan, , XIV Prince, Florentine Republic, Ludovico Sforza, Niccolo Machiavelli, VIII France, 20th century, cesare borgia,
Approximate Word count = 1345
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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