finished_summaries/shmoop/The Prince/section_20_part_0.txt
The Prince.chapter 20
chapter 20
{"name": "Chapter 20", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-20", "summary": "People do all kinds of things in order to keep power. They take guns away from people, try to turn them against one another, build fortresses, tear them down. All sorts of things. But let's talk about if they are helpful or not. First, taking away guns. This is a bad idea for most rulers. If you give arms to people, they are excited. If you take them away, they wonder why you don't like them and start to hate you. And we all know where that leads--right, Shmoop rulers of tomorrow? The only people who should be doing this are people who already have vast established kingdoms and are just adding this new one to their collection. Then, go right ahead. You have your army already and taking away arms will keep the state weak. Next, dividing towns into factions and making them fight amongst each other. Now, for some reason, people keep saying this is a good idea. As the president of Panem will tell you, it is not. The weaker faction will turn against you and the stronger one won't be able to defend against a foreign invasion. Just say no. Next, stirring up trouble intentionally. Do it. It will make you seem more awesome if you take care of it like a pro. You'll have a reputation of being a good ruler, and everyone will like you. Machiavelli just leaves us a note here to remember if you take a nation with inside help, you need to be pretty suspicious of those guys that helped you. Hey, they turned on their previous ruler, why shouldn't they turn on you, newbie? Fortresses. Machiavelli approves, but only because everyone has been doing it forever. Mostly they are only helpful if you're afraid of your own people, because they hate you--which, as we all know by now, is the beginning of a downward spiral. The important thing to remember is that fortresses can't help you for long if your people hate you.", "analysis": ""}

1. Some princes, so as to hold securely the state, have disarmed their
subjects; others have kept their subject towns distracted by factions;
others have fostered enmities against themselves; others have laid
themselves out to gain over those whom they distrusted in the beginning
of their governments; some have built fortresses; some have overthrown
and destroyed them. And although one cannot give a final judgment on all
of these things unless one possesses the particulars of those states
in which a decision has to be made, nevertheless I will speak as
comprehensively as the matter of itself will admit.

2. There never was a new prince who has disarmed his subjects; rather
when he has found them disarmed he has always armed them, because, by
arming them, those arms become yours, those men who were distrusted
become faithful, and those who were faithful are kept so, and your
subjects become your adherents. And whereas all subjects cannot be
armed, yet when those whom you do arm are benefited, the others can be
handled more freely, and this difference in their treatment, which they
quite understand, makes the former your dependents, and the latter,
considering it to be necessary that those who have the most danger and
service should have the most reward, excuse you. But when you disarm
them, you at once offend them by showing that you distrust them, either
for cowardice or for want of loyalty, and either of these opinions
breeds hatred against you. And because you cannot remain unarmed, it
follows that you turn to mercenaries, which are of the character already
shown; even if they should be good they would not be sufficient to
defend you against powerful enemies and distrusted subjects. Therefore,
as I have said, a new prince in a new principality has always
distributed arms. Histories are full of examples. But when a prince
acquires a new state, which he adds as a province to his old one, then
it is necessary to disarm the men of that state, except those who have
been his adherents in acquiring it; and these again, with time and
opportunity, should be rendered soft and effeminate; and matters should
be managed in such a way that all the armed men in the state shall be
your own soldiers who in your old state were living near you.

3. Our forefathers, and those who were reckoned wise, were accustomed
to say that it was necessary to hold Pistoia by factions and Pisa by
fortresses; and with this idea they fostered quarrels in some of their
tributary towns so as to keep possession of them the more easily.
This may have been well enough in those times when Italy was in a way
balanced, but I do not believe that it can be accepted as a precept
for to-day, because I do not believe that factions can ever be of use;
rather it is certain that when the enemy comes upon you in divided
cities you are quickly lost, because the weakest party will always
assist the outside forces and the other will not be able to resist.
The Venetians, moved, as I believe, by the above reasons, fostered the
Guelph and Ghibelline factions in their tributary cities; and although
they never allowed them to come to bloodshed, yet they nursed these
disputes amongst them, so that the citizens, distracted by their
differences, should not unite against them. Which, as we saw, did not
afterwards turn out as expected, because, after the rout at Vaila, one
party at once took courage and seized the state. Such methods argue,
therefore, weakness in the prince, because these factions will never be
permitted in a vigorous principality; such methods for enabling one the
more easily to manage subjects are only useful in times of peace, but if
war comes this policy proves fallacious.

4. Without doubt princes become great when they overcome the
difficulties and obstacles by which they are confronted, and therefore
fortune, especially when she desires to make a new prince great, who
has a greater necessity to earn renown than an hereditary one, causes
enemies to arise and form designs against him, in order that he may have
the opportunity of overcoming them, and by them to mount higher, as by a
ladder which his enemies have raised. For this reason many consider that
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.

5. Princes, especially new ones, have found more fidelity and assistance
in those men who in the beginning of their rule were distrusted than
among those who in the beginning were trusted. Pandolfo Petrucci, Prince
of Siena, ruled his state more by those who had been distrusted than by
others. But on this question one cannot speak generally, for it varies
so much with the individual; I will only say this, that those men who
at the commencement of a princedom have been hostile, if they are of
a description to need assistance to support themselves, can always be
gained over with the greatest ease, and they will be tightly held to
serve the prince with fidelity, inasmuch as they know it to be very
necessary for them to cancel by deeds the bad impression which he had
formed of them; and thus the prince always extracts more profit from
them than from those who, serving him in too much security, may neglect
his affairs. And since the matter demands it, I must not fail to warn a
prince, who by means of secret favours has acquired a new state, that he
must well consider the reasons which induced those to favour him who
did so; and if it be not a natural affection towards him, but only
discontent with their government, then he will only keep them friendly
with great trouble and difficulty, for it will be impossible to satisfy
them. And weighing well the reasons for this in those examples which
can be taken from ancient and modern affairs, we shall find that it is
easier for the prince to make friends of those men who were contented
under the former government, and are therefore his enemies, than of
those who, being discontented with it, were favourable to him and
encouraged him to seize it.

6. It has been a custom with princes, in order to hold their states
more securely, to build fortresses that may serve as a bridle and bit
to those who might design to work against them, and as a place of refuge
from a first attack. I praise this system because it has been made use
of formerly. Notwithstanding that, Messer Nicolo Vitelli in our times
has been seen to demolish two fortresses in Citta di Castello so that he
might keep that state; Guido Ubaldo, Duke of Urbino, on returning to
his dominion, whence he had been driven by Cesare Borgia, razed to the
foundations all the fortresses in that province, and considered that
without them it would be more difficult to lose it; the Bentivogli
returning to Bologna came to a similar decision. Fortresses, therefore,
are useful or not according to circumstances; if they do you good in one
way they injure you in another. And this question can be reasoned thus:
the prince who has more to fear from the people than from foreigners
ought to build fortresses, but he who has more to fear from foreigners
than from the people ought to leave them alone. The castle of Milan,
built by Francesco Sforza, has made, and will make, more trouble for the
house of Sforza than any other disorder in the state. For this reason
the best possible fortress is--not to be hated by the people, because,
although you may hold the fortresses, yet they will not save you if the
people hate you, for there will never be wanting foreigners to assist
a people who have taken arms against you. It has not been seen in our
times that such fortresses have been of use to any prince, unless to the
Countess of Forli,(*) when the Count Girolamo, her consort, was killed;
for by that means she was able to withstand the popular attack and wait
for assistance from Milan, and thus recover her state; and the posture
of affairs was such at that time that the foreigners could not assist
the people. But fortresses were of little value to her afterwards when
Cesare Borgia attacked her, and when the people, her enemy, were allied
with foreigners. Therefore, it would have been safer for her, both then
and before, not to have been hated by the people than to have had the
fortresses. All these things considered then, I shall praise him
who builds fortresses as well as him who does not, and I shall blame
whoever, trusting in them, cares little about being hated by the people.

     (*) Catherine Sforza, a daughter of Galeazzo Sforza and
     Lucrezia Landriani, born 1463, died 1509. It was to the
     Countess of Forli that Machiavelli was sent as envoy on 1499.
     A letter from Fortunati to the countess announces the
     appointment: "I have been with the signori," wrote
     Fortunati, "to learn whom they would send and when. They
     tell me that Nicolo Machiavelli, a learned young Florentine
     noble, secretary to my Lords of the Ten, is to leave with me
     at once." Cf. "Catherine Sforza," by Count Pasolini,
     translated by P. Sylvester, 1898.




Chapter 20
People do all kinds of things in order to keep power. They take guns away from people, try to turn them against one another, build fortresses, tear them down. All sorts of things. But let's talk about if they are helpful or not. First, taking away guns. This is a bad idea for most rulers. If you give arms to people, they are excited. If you take them away, they wonder why you don't like them and start to hate you. And we all know where that leads--right, Shmoop rulers of tomorrow? The only people who should be doing this are people who already have vast established kingdoms and are just adding this new one to their collection. Then, go right ahead. You have your army already and taking away arms will keep the state weak. Next, dividing towns into factions and making them fight amongst each other. Now, for some reason, people keep saying this is a good idea. As the president of Panem will tell you, it is not. The weaker faction will turn against you and the stronger one won't be able to defend against a foreign invasion. Just say no. Next, stirring up trouble intentionally. Do it. It will make you seem more awesome if you take care of it like a pro. You'll have a reputation of being a good ruler, and everyone will like you. Machiavelli just leaves us a note here to remember if you take a nation with inside help, you need to be pretty suspicious of those guys that helped you. Hey, they turned on their previous ruler, why shouldn't they turn on you, newbie? Fortresses. Machiavelli approves, but only because everyone has been doing it forever. Mostly they are only helpful if you're afraid of your own people, because they hate you--which, as we all know by now, is the beginning of a downward spiral. The important thing to remember is that fortresses can't help you for long if your people hate you.