Machiavelli's The Prince

Words: 269
Pages: 2

These chapters of The Prince contain Machiavelli’s advice on how a prince should rule and behave in front of his public. Chapter 15 explains that, as humans, princes are unable of having all the good traits people think a prince should have. Instead, the Prince should know how to use his inevitably bad traits to rule successfully and keep up a good public image. In Chapter 16, Machiavelli goes on to say that a prince should be willing to commit to having a luxurious lifestyle in order to have people consider him a good leader, but he must heavily tax them and make the people detest him first. Chapter 17 goes on to say that princes are more likely to find success to have success in keeping their subjects under control with cruelty instead