Mixed Principalities
But difficulties abound in new principalities. First, when a principality is not wholly new but is joined to the prince’s ancient dominions, forming what may be called a mixed principality, changes arise from a cause common to all new states. People, believing they can improve their condition, are always ready to change rulers. In this expectation they will take up arms against any ruler. In this they deceive themselves, later discovering through experience that they are worse off than before.
This result follows naturally and necessarily because the prince cannot avoid offending his new subjects, whether through the troops he quarters among them or through any of the countless hardships that accompany a new acquisition. You therefore make enemies of all those whom you injured in seizing the principality, yet you cannot retain the friendship of those who helped you acquire it. You cannot reward them as they expect, nor, because you are indebted to them, can you use harsh measures against them. However strong your army may be, when entering a new province you must have the goodwill of its inhabitants.
For this reason, Louis XII of France gained possession of Milan quickly and lost it just as quickly. On the first occasion, Ludovico Sforza was able to take it from him with his own forces alone. The very people who had opened the gates to the King of France found themselves deceived in their expectations and hopes of future benefits, and they could not endure the insolence of their new ruler.
It is true that when a state rebels and is subdued again, it will not afterward be lost so easily. Using the rebellion as a pretext, the prince will not hesitate to secure himself by punishing the guilty, bringing suspects to trial, and strengthening every vulnerable point in his position. Thus, although on the first occasion it took only Duke Ludovico raising alarms along the frontier to wrest Milan from the French, on the second occasion the whole world had to be arrayed against them, and their armies had to be destroyed and driven out of Italy. This happened for the reasons already given.
Yet Milan was lost to the king a second time. The general causes of the first loss have been shown. It remains to identify the causes of the second and to point out the remedies available to the French king, or to anyone else in similar circumstances, for maintaining a conquest more successfully than he did.
States that are joined upon acquisition to a prince’s ancient dominions are either in the same region and speak the same language as his existing subjects, or they do not. When they do, they can be retained with great ease, especially if they have not been accustomed to living in freedom. To hold them securely, it is enough to eliminate the family line of the former ruler. If their previous conditions are otherwise continued and their customs do not conflict with those of the prince’s other territories, people will live peacefully together. We see this in Brittany, Burgundy, Gascony, and Normandy, which have been united with France for so long. Although their languages differ slightly, their customs are similar, and they can easily live together.
Anyone who acquires such a state and intends to keep it must attend to two things: first, the bloodline of its former princes must be extinguished; second, its laws and taxes must not be changed. In this way, the newly acquired state quickly becomes incorporated into the hereditary state.
But when states are acquired in a country that differs in language, customs, and laws, difficulties multiply, and both great good fortune and great ability are needed to overcome them. One of the best and most effective methods is for the prince who acquires such a state to go and live there himself. This will make his possession more secure and lasting.
The Turkish ruler followed this course in Greece. Despite every other precaution he took to secure that province, he could never have held it if he had not gone to live there. When you are present, disorders are detected as they begin and can be remedied quickly. When you are far away, you hear of them only after they have gathered strength and can no longer be cured. Moreover, the province where you reside is not plundered by your officials. The people are pleased to have ready access to their prince and therefore have more reason to love him if they are well disposed, or to fear him if they are disaffected. A foreign enemy wishing to attack that state will proceed cautiously. In short, it is extremely difficult to drive out a prince who resides there in person.
Another excellent measure is to establish colonies in one or two places that can serve as the keys to the province. Otherwise, the prince must maintain a large force of cavalry and infantry there. Colonies do not cost a prince much. He can send and support them at little or no expense to himself, and he offends only those whose fields and houses he takes to give to the new inhabitants. Those who are injured form only a small part of the community. Because they remain poor and scattered, they can never become dangerous. Everyone else is left undisturbed and therefore easily kept quiet. At the same time, they fear making a false move lest they share the fate of those deprived of their possessions.
In short, colonies cost less than soldiers, are more loyal, and cause less offense. Those who are offended cannot do harm because, as I have said, they are poor and dispersed. It must be noted that people should either be treated kindly or completely crushed. They can avenge slight injuries, but not severe ones. Therefore, an injury done to someone should be of a kind that leaves no fear of revenge.
But if troops are sent instead of colonies, the expense is far greater, and all the revenues of the country are consumed in guarding it. The acquisition therefore becomes a loss, and much greater offense is caused. As the soldiers’ quarters are moved from place to place, the whole country suffers. Everyone feels the hardship, and everyone becomes an enemy. These enemies can cause harm because, although defeated, they remain in their own homes. In every respect, therefore, military occupation is as disadvantageous as colonization is useful.
A prince who establishes himself in a province whose laws and language differ from those of his own people should also make himself the leader and protector of its weaker neighbors. He should try to weaken the stronger ones and take care that no foreign power as strong as himself gains entrance there. Such a power will always be invited in by inhabitants who are discontented through either ambition or fear. In this way, the Aetolians once brought the Romans into Greece, and in every other country the Romans entered, they were invited by its inhabitants.
The usual course of events is that as soon as a powerful foreigner enters a province, all the weaker powers side with him, moved by their hostility toward the ruler who has previously kept them in subjection. The newcomer need make no effort to win these lesser powers. They immediately and willingly unite themselves with his government. He has only to ensure that they do not grow too powerful. With his own forces and their goodwill, he can easily subdue those who are strong and remain supreme in the province. Whoever fails to manage this well will soon lose what he has gained, and while he retains it, he will face endless troubles and annoyances.
In governing the countries they conquered, the Romans diligently followed the methods I have described. They planted colonies, conciliated weaker powers without increasing their strength, humbled the powerful, and never allowed a formidable foreign power to gain influence. One example will be enough. In Greece, the Romans took the Achaeans and Aetolians into their pay, humbled the Macedonian kingdom, and drove out Antiochus. Yet the services of the Achaeans and Aetolians never gained them any increase in power. Philip’s arguments could not persuade the Romans to become his friends on the condition that they refrain from humiliating him. Nor could all the power of Antiochus induce them to let him exercise any authority within that province.
In acting this way, the Romans did what all wise rulers should do. They considered not only present difficulties but also future ones, guarding against them with every effort. When dangers are foreseen while still distant, they can be remedied easily. If one waits for them to approach, the remedy comes too late because the disorder has become incurable. It is like the hectic fever described by physicians: at first it is easy to cure but difficult to recognize; later, because it was neither detected nor treated at the beginning, it becomes easy to recognize but impossible to cure.
So it is with affairs of state. When disorders are discovered at their beginning, as only a prudent ruler can discover them, they can easily be dealt with. But when they go unnoticed and are allowed to grow until everyone can see them, no remedy remains.
The Romans therefore foresaw evils while they were still far off and always guarded against them. They never allowed dangers to develop merely to avoid war, because they knew that war is not avoided but only postponed to the advantage of the other side. They chose to wage war against Philip and Antiochus in Greece so that they would not later have to fight them in Italy, although they could have avoided both wars for a time. They did not want that. Nor did the maxim Leave it to time, which the wise men of our day constantly repeat, ever appeal to them. They trusted instead in the fruits of their own valor and foresight. Time drives everything before it and may bring evil as well as good.
Let us now return to France and examine whether she followed any of the methods I have described. I will speak of Louis rather than Charles because Louis held Italy longer, making his conduct easier to examine. You will find that he did the exact opposite of what he should have done to retain a foreign state.
King Louis was brought into Italy by the ambition of the Venetians, who hoped that his arrival would gain them half the state of Lombardy. I will not condemn the king for coming or for the part he took. He wanted a foothold in Italy, but he had no friends there. On the contrary, because of Charles’s conduct, every door was closed to him, so he was compelled to accept whatever alliances he could obtain. His plans might easily have succeeded if he had not made other mistakes in his conduct.
By recovering Lombardy, Louis immediately regained the influence Charles had lost. Genoa submitted. The Florentines came to terms. The Marquis of Mantua, the Duke of Ferrara, the Bentivogli, the Countess of Forlì, the lords of Faenza, Pesaro, Rimini, Camerino, and Piombino, and the citizens of Lucca, Pisa, and Siena all came forward to offer their friendship. The Venetians then had reason to regret the reckless game they had played. To gain two towns in Lombardy, they had made the King of France master of two-thirds of Italy.
Consider, then, how easily King Louis could have maintained his authority in Italy if he had followed the rules given above and secured and protected all these friends. They were numerous but weak, and they feared either the Church or the Venetians. Necessity therefore compelled them to attach themselves to him, and with their help he could readily have protected himself against any other powerful state.
But as soon as he was in Milan, he did the opposite by helping Pope Alexander occupy Romagna. He failed to see that by supporting this enterprise he weakened himself, alienating his friends and those who had placed themselves in his hands, while strengthening the Church by adding great temporal power to the spiritual power that already gave it such immense authority. Having made this first mistake, he was forced to continue on the same course. At last, to restrain Pope Alexander’s ambition and prevent him from becoming master of Tuscany, Louis was obliged to come into Italy himself.
As though enlarging the Church and stripping himself of friends were not enough, Louis, desiring to possess the Kingdom of Naples, divided it with the King of Spain. He thus brought into Italy, where he had previously been supreme, a rival to whom the ambitious and discontented of that province could turn. He might have left in Naples a king willing to rule as his tributary. Instead, he removed that king to make room for another ruler powerful enough to drive Louis himself out.
The desire to acquire is undoubtedly natural and common. Whenever people attempt what lies within their power, they will be praised rather than blamed. But when they persist in attempting what is beyond their power, misfortune and blame follow. If France could have attacked Naples with her own forces, she should have done so. If she could not, she should not have divided it. Her partition of Lombardy with the Venetians may be excused because it enabled her to gain a foothold in Italy. The partition of Naples must be condemned because no similar necessity justified it.
Louis, then, made five errors. He destroyed the weaker states, strengthened a ruler who was already powerful, brought a very powerful foreigner into the country, failed to reside there, and established no colonies. Yet while he lived, even these errors might not have proved disastrous if he had not added a sixth by depriving the Venetians of their dominions.
If Louis had neither enlarged the Church nor brought Spain into Italy, it might have been both reasonable and necessary to humble the Venetians. But after committing himself to those other courses, he should never have consented to Venice’s ruin. While the Venetians remained powerful, they would always have deterred others from attempting to seize Lombardy. They would never have agreed to such an enterprise unless they themselves were to become its masters. Others would not have wanted to take Lombardy from France merely to hand it over to Venice, nor would they have dared to defy both France and Venice.
If it is argued that King Louis ceded Romagna to Alexander and Naples to Spain to avoid war, I answer, for the reasons already given, that you should never allow your plans to be disrupted merely to avoid war. War is not avoided but only postponed to your disadvantage. If others point to the king’s promise to the pope to undertake that enterprise for him in exchange for the dissolution of Louis’s marriage and the cardinal’s hat granted to d’Amboise, I answer by referring to what I say later about the promises of princes and how they should be kept.
King Louis therefore lost Lombardy because he followed none of the methods used by others who conquered provinces with the intention of keeping them. There is nothing strange in this. It is only what could reasonably and naturally have been expected.
I spoke about this very subject with d’Amboise at Nantes, when Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander and commonly called Duke Valentino, was occupying Romagna. The cardinal told me that the Italians did not understand warfare. I answered that the French did not understand statecraft, for if they had, they would never have allowed the Church to become so powerful. Events have shown that France brought about the increased power of the Church and Spain in Italy, and that those powers in turn caused France’s ruin.
From this we may draw a general rule that rarely, if ever, fails: Whoever causes another to become powerful brings about his own ruin. Such power must be created either by skill or by force, and both arouse distrust in the person who has been raised to power.
Why Darius’s Kingdom Did Not Rebel After Alexander’s Death
Alexander the Great conquered Asia in a few years and died before he had fully taken possession of it. Given the difficulty of preserving newly acquired states, one might have expected the whole country to revolt after his death. Nevertheless, his successors were able to retain it, encountering no difficulties except those caused by their own ambition and mutual jealousy.
If anyone finds this strange and asks why it happened, I answer that every principality known to us has been governed in one of two ways: either by a single prince, with everyone else serving as ministers who help govern the kingdom by his grace and favor; or by a prince together with barons who hold their rank not through the favor of a superior lord but through ancient lineage. These barons have states and subjects of their own, who recognize them as rulers and feel a natural affection for them. In states governed by one prince and his servants, the prince holds more complete authority. Throughout the land, he alone is recognized as sovereign. If anyone else is obeyed, it is only in his capacity as a minister or official, toward whom the people feel no special personal attachment.
Examples of these two forms of government in our own time are the Turkish Empire and the kingdom of France. The entire Turkish Empire is governed by a single ruler, and everyone else is his slave. He divides his kingdom into sanjaks and sends different governors to administer them, moving and replacing them as he pleases. The king of France, by contrast, is surrounded by many nobles of ancient descent. Each is acknowledged and loved by subjects of his own, and each claims a precedence in rank that the king can take from him only at his peril.
Anyone who considers the different character of these two states will see that the Turkish Empire would be difficult to conquer but easy to hold once conquered. One obstacle to its conquest is that an invader cannot be invited in by native nobles or expect his enterprise to be aided by the defection of those surrounding the sovereign. The reasons have already been given: because they are all slaves and under obligations to him, they are not easily corrupted; and even if they are corrupted, they can offer little help because, as I have explained, they cannot bring the people with them. Anyone who attacks the Turkish ruler must therefore expect to find a united people and must rely on his own strength rather than on divisions among his opponents. But once that ruler has been overcome and defeated in the field so decisively that he cannot rebuild his armies, nothing remains to fear except his family. If that family is eliminated, no one else poses a threat, since all the others lack influence with the people. Just as the invader could expect nothing from them before his victory, he has nothing to fear from them afterward.
The opposite is true of kingdoms governed like France. Because discontented men who desire change can always be found there, you may readily enter such a kingdom by winning over one of its barons. For the reasons already given, such men can open the way for your invasion and make conquest easy. Afterward, however, any attempt to hold your position involves endless difficulties, both with those who helped you and with those you overthrew. Destroying the prince’s family will not be enough, since the other lords remain and can place themselves at the head of new movements. Because you can neither satisfy nor destroy them all, you will lose the state whenever an opportunity arises for them.
If you examine the nature of Darius’s government, you will find that it resembled that of the Turkish ruler. Alexander therefore first had to defeat Darius completely and strip him of his dominions. Once Darius had been defeated and had died, the country was permanently secured to Alexander for the reasons already explained. If Alexander’s successors had remained united, they could have possessed it undisturbed, since no disorders arose in that kingdom except those they created themselves.
Kingdoms organized like France cannot be retained so easily. This explains the repeated uprisings of Spain, Gaul, and Greece against the Romans, which resulted from the many small principalities that once composed those provinces. As long as the memory of those principalities survived, the Romans could never regard their possession as secure. But when the authority and long duration of Roman rule had erased that memory, the Romans gained a secure hold. Later, during their conflicts with one another, individual Romans could each draw along the portion of those provinces in which they had acquired influence. Once the lines of their former princes were extinct, the inhabitants recognized no other lords than the Romans.
With all this in mind, no one should wonder that Alexander could so easily establish a firm hold on Asia while Pyrrhus and many others had difficulty preserving their conquests. The difference arose not from the greater or lesser merit of the conquerors, but from the different character of the states with which they had to deal.
