Just finished Machiavelli's The Prince and I'm thinking that anyone who considers themselves even the slightest bit tough should probably go ahead and read this. I'm not purporting to be tough but I certainly recognize toughness when I see it or read it. There is lots of talk of crushing the opposition and being cruel when necessary (make it quick, he says). He reminds the reader than fortune is a woman and can only be made submissive if you beat and coerce her. Damn, I can't imagine someone saying that today, except for maybe John McCain.
All toughness aside, this treatise is credited as a predecessor of the realist political theory. I know that I tend to lean more to the idealist side of this theoretical coin, but I think it's valuable to be reminded that it's important to remember how things are when forming ideas about how they should be. Reading this I'm also reminded how uncivilized we really are, despite what I'd like to believe.
1 comment:
Your boy Machiavelli IS tough, just read that first paragraph of the New Yorker article about him.
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