finished_summaries/shmoop/The Prince/section_24_part_0.txt
The Prince.chapter 24
chapter 24
{"name": "Chapter 24", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-24", "summary": "These rules are a quick-start guide to ruling a kingdom. In just a few short years, you, too, can have all the prestige of a well-established ruler. Plus, people will love you more because they will be extra surprised that you didn't failjust like people are amazed when babies do anything. Enough of that. Let's talk about why Italy has been failing so hard recently. We all know why. What is Machiavelli's number one rule? Have a strong army. What haven't they had? Any kind of decent army at all. Yet they are whining about how they lost their states because of \"bad luck.\" It's not luck, people. You should have been training an army. Mr. Machiavelli gets himself pretty worked up about this.", "analysis": ""}

The previous suggestions, carefully observed, will enable a new prince
to appear well established, and render him at once more secure and fixed
in the state than if he had been long seated there. For the actions of
a new prince are more narrowly observed than those of an hereditary
one, and when they are seen to be able they gain more men and bind
far tighter than ancient blood; because men are attracted more by the
present than by the past, and when they find the present good they enjoy
it and seek no further; they will also make the utmost defence of a
prince if he fails them not in other things. Thus it will be a double
glory for him to have established a new principality, and adorned and
strengthened it with good laws, good arms, good allies, and with a good
example; so will it be a double disgrace to him who, born a prince,
shall lose his state by want of wisdom.

And if those seigniors are considered who have lost their states in
Italy in our times, such as the King of Naples, the Duke of Milan,
and others, there will be found in them, firstly, one common defect in
regard to arms from the causes which have been discussed at length; in
the next place, some one of them will be seen, either to have had the
people hostile, or if he has had the people friendly, he has not known
how to secure the nobles. In the absence of these defects states that
have power enough to keep an army in the field cannot be lost.

Philip of Macedon, not the father of Alexander the Great, but he who
was conquered by Titus Quintius, had not much territory compared to
the greatness of the Romans and of Greece who attacked him, yet being a
warlike man who knew how to attract the people and secure the nobles, he
sustained the war against his enemies for many years, and if in the
end he lost the dominion of some cities, nevertheless he retained the
kingdom.

Therefore, do not let our princes accuse fortune for the loss of their
principalities after so many years' possession, but rather their own
sloth, because in quiet times they never thought there could be a change
(it is a common defect in man not to make any provision in the calm
against the tempest), and when afterwards the bad times came they
thought of flight and not of defending themselves, and they hoped that
the people, disgusted with the insolence of the conquerors, would recall
them. This course, when others fail, may be good, but it is very bad to
have neglected all other expedients for that, since you would never
wish to fall because you trusted to be able to find someone later on to
restore you. This again either does not happen, or, if it does, it will
not be for your security, because that deliverance is of no avail which
does not depend upon yourself; those only are reliable, certain, and
durable that depend on yourself and your valour.




Chapter 24
These rules are a quick-start guide to ruling a kingdom. In just a few short years, you, too, can have all the prestige of a well-established ruler. Plus, people will love you more because they will be extra surprised that you didn't failjust like people are amazed when babies do anything. Enough of that. Let's talk about why Italy has been failing so hard recently. We all know why. What is Machiavelli's number one rule? Have a strong army. What haven't they had? Any kind of decent army at all. Yet they are whining about how they lost their states because of "bad luck." It's not luck, people. You should have been training an army. Mr. Machiavelli gets himself pretty worked up about this.