The more sand has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it. – Niccolo Machiavelli
Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others. – Niccolo Machiavelli
It 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 Machiavelli
So long as the great majority of men are not deprived of either property or honor, they are satisfied. – Niccolo Machiavelli