Niccolo Machiavelli

Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius Niccolo Machiavelli

Book Excerpt: ...a grave blunder we should suspect some fraud to lurk behindXLIX. That a Commonwealth to preserve its Freedom has constant need of new Ordinances. Of the services in respect of which Quintius Fabius received the surname of MaximusNICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLITOZANOBI BUONDELMONTI AND COSIMO RUCELLAIHEALTH. I send you a gift, which if it answers ill the obligations I owe you, is at any rate the greatest which Niccolò Machiavelli has it in his power to offer. For in it I have expressed whatever I have learned, or have observed for myself during a long experience and constant study of human affairs. And since neither you nor any other can expect more at my hands, you cannot complain if I have not given you more. You may indeed lament the poverty of my wit, since what I have to say is but poorly said; and tax the weakness of my judgment, which on many points may have erred in its conclusions. But granting all this, I know not which of us is less beholden to the other: I to you, who have forced me...