Although many of the same ideas are contained in both The Prince and the
Discourses, these two works differ significantly in emphasis because they
discuss two different types of political systems. The Prince, is one of the
first examinations of politics and science from a purely scientific and rational
perspective. In The Prince, Machiavelli was concerned with a principality, a
state in which one ruler or a small elite governs a mass of subjects who have no
active political life. Machiavelli addresses a monarchical ruler, the Medici,
and offered advice designed to keep that ruler in power. He recommended policies
that would discourage mass political activism and channel the subjects energies
into private pursuits. Machiavelli's aim was to persuade the monarch that he
could best preserve his power by using violence carefully and economically, by
respecting the persons, property, and traditions of his subjects, and by
promoting material prosperity. The ruling Prince should be the sole authority
determining every aspect of the state and put in effect policies which serves
his best interests. These interests were gaining, maintaining, and expanding his
political. However, Machiavelli did not feel that a Prince should mistreat his
citizens. This suggestion is once again to serve the Prince's best interests. If
a prince can not be both feared and loved, Machiavelli suggests, it would be
better for him to be feared by the citizens within his own principality. He
makes the generalization that men are, "...ungrateful, fickle, liars, and
deceivers, they shun danger and are greedy for profit; while you treat them well
they are yours". He characterizes men as being self centered and not
willing to act in the best interest of the state,"[and when the prince] is
in danger they turn against [him]". Machiavelli reinforces the prince's
need to be feared by stating: "Men worry less about doing an injury to one
who makes himself loved than to one who makes himself feared. The bond of love
is one which men, wretched creatures they are, break when it is to their
advantage to do so; but fear is strengthened by a dread of punishment which is
always effective". In order to win honor, Machiavelli suggests that a
prince must be readily willing to deceive the citizens. One way is to
"...show his esteem for talent actively encouraging the able and honoring
those who excel in their professions...so that they can go peaceably about their
business". By encouraging citizens to excel at their professions he would
also be encouraging them to "...increase the prosperity of the their
state". These measures, though carried out in deception, would bring the
prince honor and trust amongst the citizens, especially those who were in the
best positions to oppose him. Machiavelli actively promoted a secular form of
politics. He laid aside the medieval conception "of the state as a
necessary creation for humankind's spiritual, material, and social well
being". In such a state,"[a] ruler was justified in his exercise of
political power only if it contributed to the common good of the people he
served, [and] the ethical side of a prince's activity...ought to [be] based on
Christian moral principles...." Machiavelli believed a secular form of
government to be a more realistic type. His views were to the benefit of the
prince, in helping him maintain power rather than to serve to the well being of
the citizens. Machiavelli promoted his belief by stating: "The fact is that
a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among
those who are not virtuous. Therefore, if a prince wants to maintain his rule he
must learn not to be so virtuous, and to make use of this or not according to
need". While The Prince is Machiavelli's best known work, it is The
Discourses, which portray the most about him. The Prince was just a pamphlet
dashed off to gain influence with the Medici, but in The Discourses he sought to
include his entire system of politics. In the Discourses, Machiavelli was mainly
concerned with a republic, a state collectively controlled by a politically
active citizenry. Depending on their institutional arrangements, republics could
be either aristocratic or democratic. Machiavelli advocated a democratic
constitution modeled after ancient Rome. In the Discourses his concern was to
preserve the liberty and independence of a self-governing citizenry. He
emphasized the idea that a republic needed to foster a spirit of patriotism and
civic virtue among its citizens if it were to survive. In addition Machiavelli
rejected the traditional republican theory that social harmony and unity were
essential to political liberty. He argued that factions and class divisions were
inevitable in human society and that republics could be strengthened by the
conflicts generated through open and widespread political participation and
debate. Machiavelli discusses six types of governments in The Discourses, three
of them good, and three of them bad. The good Republics are democracies,
aristocracies, and principalities and the bad are oligarchies, tyrannies, and
anarchy. Machiavelli states that the three good governments are similar to its
bad counterpart since they can easily jump from one form to another. "A
democracy is converted into anarchy with no difficulty". Hence when a
founder of a city organizes one of these three governments in a city, he
organizes it for only a brief period of time, since no precautions can prevent
it from slipping into its contrary. The only solution is to implement a mixed
government, such as ancient Rome. "Thus, those who were prudent in
establishing laws recognized this fact, and avoiding each of these forms in
themselves, chose one that combined all, judging such a government to be
steadier and more stable, for when there is in the same city-state a
principality, an aristocracy, and a democracy, one form keeps watch over the
other." In general, the basic idea of The Discourses is the superiority of
the democratic republic and the ultimate reliance of even the most despotic
regimes on the mass consent of the people. Machiavelli did not construct an
abstract and unified philosophical system. Rather, his orientation was
practical, and his method was empirical and impressionistic. His political
writings contain a series of generalizations taken from ancient and contemporary
history about the possibilities and limitations of various courses of political
action. One of the most distinctive and controversial characteristics of
Machiavelli's thought is that he did not devote much attention to the values
that define the ends of political action. Instead he concentrated on
distinguishing those circumstances in which a political act will have morally
justified consequences from those circumstances in which it will not. In his
view, political actions, much more than the activities of private life, have
consequences that cannot be foreseen or fully controlled. Therefore, political
life cannot be governed by a single set of moral (or religious) absolutes, and
the political agent may sometimes be excused for performing acts of violence and
deception that would be ethically indefensible in private life. Partly because
Machiavelli's subtle and ironic view of the relationship between ethics and
politics has been widely misinterpreted, Machiavelli is sometimes perceived as
one who manipulates others in an opportunistic and deceptive manner.