Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureGod is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 7.9
Political literature · Philosophical literatureWhoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasions for it.Niccolo MachiavelliDiscourses on Livy · 1531★ 6.2
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureA prince being thus obliged to know well how to act as a beast must imitate the fox and the lion, for the lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 5.5
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureThe chief foundations of all states, new as well as old or composite, are good laws and good arms; and as there cannot be good laws where the state is not well armed, it follows that where they are well armed they have good laws.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 4.7
Novel · Satirical fiction · SatireTo laugh is proper to man.Francois RabelaisGargantua and Pantagruel · 1534★ 4.7
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureAmong other evils which being unarmed brings you, it causes you to be despised.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 4.0
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureHe [the prince] holds to what is right when he can but knows how to do wrong when he must.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 4.0
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureSo long as the great majority of men are not deprived of either property or honour, they are satisfied.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 4.0
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureThis leads to a debate: is it better to be loved than feared, or the reverse? The answer is that it is desirable to be both, but because it is difficult to join them together, it is much safer for a prince to be feared than loved, if he is to fail in one of the two.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 3.9
Political literature · Philosophical literatureIt is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope.Niccolo Machiavelli1531★ 3.7
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureThere are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is most excellent, the second is good, the third is useless.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 3.0
Treatise · Political literature · Philosophical literatureMany have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live; that he who neglects what is done for what ought to be done, will rather bring about his own ruin that his preservation.Niccolo MachiavelliThe Prince · 1532★ 3.0
Political literature · Philosophical literatureThe cause of the bad and of the good fortune of men is the way in which their method of working fits the times.Niccolo Machiavelli1531★ 2.1
Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world.Martin Luther1538★ 1.3
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