Latest / Logic Library / 02 - The Prince - Machiavelli

Transcript

02 - The Prince - Machiavelli · Logic Library

• 0:00
  The Prince by Niccolo Macchiavelli, translated by W. K. Marriott. The
• 0:08
  Man and his Works. No one can say where the bones of Machiavelli rest,
• 0:15
  but modern Florence has decreed him a stately cenotaph in Santa Croce, by
• 0:20
  the side of her most famous sons, recognizing that whatever nations may have found
• 0:26
  in his works, Italy found in them the idea of her unity and the
• 0:31
  germs of her renaissance among the nations of Europe. Whilst it is idle to
• 0:37
  protest against the world wide and evil signification of his name, it may be
• 0:42
  pointed out that the harsh construction of his doctrine which this sinister reputation implies,
• 0:50
  was unknown to his own day, and that the researches of recent times have
• 0:55
  enabled us to interpret him more reasonably. It is due to thee these inquiries
• 1:00
  that the shape of an unholy necromancer, which so long haunted men's vision,
• 1:06
  has begun to fade. Machiavelli was undoubtedly a man of great observation, acuteness,
• 1:14
  and industry, noting with appreciative eye whatever passed before him, and with
• 1:21
  his supreme literary gift turning it to account in his enforced retirement from affairs.
• 1:27
  He does not present himself, nor is he depicted by his contemporaries as a
• 1:33
  type of that rare combination the successful statesman and author, for he appears to
• 1:40
  have been only moderately prosperous in his several embassies and political employments. He was
• 1:47
  misled by Caterina's Forza, ignored by Lewis the Twelfth, overawed by ciesare Borgia.
• 1:56
  Several of his embassies were quite barren of results. His attempts to fortify
• 2:00
  Florence failed, and the soldiery that he raised astonished everybody by their cowardice.
• 2:08
  In the conduct of his own affairs, he was timid and time serving.
• 2:13
  He dared not appear by the side of Soderini, whom he owed so much,
• 2:17
  for fear of compromising himself. His connection with Imidici was open to suspicion,
• 2:24
  and Giuliano appears to have recognized his real forte when he set him to
• 2:30
  write the history of Florence, rather than employ him in the state. And
• 2:37
  it is on the literary side of his character, and there alone, that
• 2:40
  we find no weakness and no failure. Although the light of almost four centuries
• 2:47
  has been focused on the prince. Its problems are still debatable and interesting,
• 2:53
  because they are the eternal problems between the ruled and their rulers, such as
• 3:00
  they are. Its ethics are those of Machiavelli's contemporaries, yet they cannot be
• 3:07
  said to be out of date, so long as the governments of Europe rely
• 3:10
  on material rather than on moral forces. Its historical incidents and personages become interesting
• 3:20
  by reason of the uses which Machiavelli makes of them to illustrate his theories of
• 3:25
  government and conduct. Leaving out of consideration those maxims of state which still furnish
• 3:34
  some European and Eastern statesmen with principles of action, the prince is bestrewn with
• 3:40
  truths that can be proved at every turn. Men still are the dupes of
• 3:46
  their simplicity and greed, as they were in the days of Alexander the sixth.
• 3:52
  The cloak of religion still conceals the vices which Machiavelli laid bare in the
• 3:58
  character of Ferdinand of arab Gone. Men will not look at things as they
• 4:02
  really are, but as they wish them to be, and are ruined in
• 4:09
  politics. There are no perfectly safe courses. Prudence consists in choosing the least
• 4:15
  dangerous ones, then to pass to a higher plane. Machiavelli reiterates that although
• 4:23
  crimes may win an empire, they do not win glory. Necessary wars are
• 4:30
  just wars, and the arms of a nation are hallowed when it has no
• 4:34
  other resource but to fight. It is the cry of a far later day
• 4:41
  than Machiavelli's that government should be elevated into a living moral force, capable of
• 4:46
  inspiring the people with a just recognition of the fundamental principles of society. To
• 4:54
  this high argument, the Prince contributes. But little Makiev always refused to write
• 5:01
  either of men or of governments otherwise than as he found them, And he
• 5:06
  writes with such skill and insight that his work is of abiding value. But
• 5:13
  what invests the Prince with more than a merely artistic or historical interest is the
• 5:18
  incontrovertible truth that it deals with the great principles which still guide nations and rulers
• 5:26
  in their relationship with each other and their neighbors. In translating the Prince,
• 5:32
  my aim has been to achieve, at all costs, an exact literal rendering
• 5:38
  of the original, rather than a fluent paraphrase adapted to the modern notions of
• 5:44
  style and expression. Machiavelli was no facile phrasemonger. The conditions under which he
• 5:51
  wrote obliged him to weigh every word. His themes were lofty, his substance
• 5:58
  grave, his manner nobly, plain and serious. Quisseofuit unquam in partiundis rebus
• 6:05
  in definiendis in explanandes pressire in the prince, It may be truly said,
• 6:14
  there is reason assignable not only for every word, but for the position of
• 6:19
  every word. To an Englishman of Shakespeare's time, the translation of such a
• 6:25
  treatise was in some ways a comparatively easy task, for in those times the
• 6:30
  genius of the English more nearly resembled that of the Italian language. To the
• 6:35
  Englishman of to day, it is not so simple. To take a single
• 6:41
  example, The word intraatenere employed by Machiavelli to indicate the policy adopted by the
• 6:48
  Roman Senate towards the weaker states of Greece, would by an Elizabethan be correctly
• 6:55
  rendered entertained, and every contemporary reader would understand what was meant by saying that
• 7:01
  Rome entertained the Eetolians and the Achaians without augmenting their power. But to day
• 7:09
  such a phrase would seem obsolete and ambiguous, if not unmeaning, we are
• 7:15
  compelled to say that Rome maintained friendly relations with the Aetolians, et cetera.
• 7:21
  Using four words to do the work of one. I have tried to preserve
• 7:26
  the pithy brevity of the Italian so far as was consistent with an absolute fidelity
• 7:31
  to the sense. If the result be an occasional disparity, I can only
• 7:38
  hope that the reader, in his eagerness to reach the author's meaning, may
• 7:42
  overlook the roughness of the road that leads him to it. The following is
• 7:47
  a list of the works of Machiavelli. Principal works Discrsus sopra Lecorsa di Pisa,
• 7:58
  fourteen ninety nine, Del Modo di tratare Ipopoli de la Valdiciana Ribellati fifteen
• 8:07
  o two, Del Modo Tenutodlduca Valentino, Nella Mazzare, Vitellozzo Vitelli, Olivorotto
• 8:16
  da Fermo cetera fifteen o two. Discorso sopra la Provinciono Deldnaro fifteen O two
• 8:26
  that Gennale Primo poem in Terza Rima, fifteen o six, Ritrati de le
• 8:35
  Corsa de la la Magna fifteen o eight to fifteen twelve, De Ciennalo es
• 8:41
  Condo fifteen O nine, Ritrati de le Cosa di Frantia fifteen ten. Discorsi
• 8:52
  sopra la prima deca di te Livio, three volumes, fifteen twelve, fifteen
• 8:58
  seventeen, Il Principe fifteen thirteen, Andrea comedy translated from Terence, fifteen thirteen,
• 9:09
  Questionmak Mandragola prose comedy in five acts with prologue in verse, fifteen thirteen,
• 9:20
  De la Lingua Dialog fifteen fourteen, Clzia comedy in prose, fifteen fifteen,
• 9:30
  Questionmark Belfagor Archidia Volo novel fifteen fifteen. Arsini d'Oro poem in Terza Rima,
• 9:43
  fifteen seventeen. Dell Arte de la Guera fifteen nineteen, fifteen twenty dis
• 9:50
  Corso sopra il riformare Lastado di Ferenze fifteen twenty So Mario de la cour use
• 10:00
  de la Chita di Lucca fifteen twenty Vita di Castruccio Catraccini da Lucca fifteen twenty,
• 10:09
  Istorio Fiorentine, eight books, fifteen twenty one to fifteen twenty five,
• 10:16
  Framenti Storici fifteen twenty five. Other poems include Sonnetti, Canzoni, ottave and
• 10:24
  Canti Carna Scileeski editions Aldo Venice, fifteen forty six. De Latertina fifteen fifty,
• 10:37
  Cambiaggi Florence, six volumes, seventeen eighty two to seventeen eighty five.
• 10:43
  Dei Classici milan ten eighteen thirteen, Silvestri nine volumes, eighteen twenty to eighteen
• 10:52
  twenty two, Passerini Fanfani Milanesi, six volumes only published eighteen seventy three to
• 11:01
  eighteen seventy seven. Minor works Editor F. L. Polidori eighteen fifty two,
• 11:11
  Lettere Familiari editor A Alvisi eighteen eighty three, two editions, one with
• 11:18
  excisions credited writings. Editor G. Canestrini eighteen fifty seven. Letters to F.
• 11:28
  Vettori, c. A. Ridolfi, Pensieri in Torno Alascopo, D.
• 11:35
  N. Macchiavelli, nell Libro il Principe et cetera d. Ferrara,
• 11:43
  The Private Correspondence of Niccolo Macchiavelli nineteen twenty nine and of the man and his works