A CRITIC AT LARGE SEPTEMBER 15, 2008 ISSUE

THE FLORENTINEThe man who taught rulers how to rule.

By Claudia Roth Pierpont

O

ne

method of torture used inFlorentine jails during the

glorious days of the Renaissancewas the strappado: a prisoner washoisted into the air by a ropeattached to his wrists, which hadbeen tied behind his back, andthen suddenly dropped towardthe floor as many times as it tookto get him to confess. Since theprocedure usually dislocated theshoulders, tore the muscles, andrendered one or both arms

Machiavelli believed that tosucceed in life a man must beadaptable.

useless, it is remarkable thatNiccolò Machiavelli, afterreportedly undergoing six such“drops,” asked for pen and paperand began to write. Machiavellihad nothing to confess. Althoughhis name had been found on anincriminating list, he had playedno part in a failed conspiracy tomurder the city’s newly restoredMedici rulers. (Some said that itwas Giuliano de’ Medici who hadbeen targeted, others that it washis brother Cardinal Giovanni.)He had been imprisoned foralmost two weeks when, inFebruary, 1513, in a desperate bidfor pardon, he wrote a pair ofsonnets addressed to the“Magnificent Giuliano,” mixingpathos with audacity andapparently inextinguishable wit. “Ihave on my legs, Giuliano, a pairof shackles,” he began, and wenton to report that the lice on thewalls of his cell were as big asbutterflies, and that the noise ofkeys and padlocks boomedaround him like Jove’sthunderbolts. Perhaps worried

that the poems would notimpress, he announced that themuse he had summoned had hithim in the face rather than renderher services to a man who waschained up like a lunatic. To theheir of a family that prided itselfon its artistic patronage, hesubmitted the outraged complaint“This is the way poets aretreated!”

Machiavelli was not especiallyknown for his poetry, and fewwould have called him a manwith a claim to Medici support.His family was distinguished butfar from rich, and had definiterepublican associations. Two ofhis father’s cousins had beenbeheaded for their opposition tothe dynasty’s founder, Cosimo de’Medici, who had effectivelybrought the historic republic toan end, in 1434, the better toprotect the family bank’senormous fortune. DuringMachiavelli’s youth, his fatherseems to have gained him entréeto the scholarly circles around the

widely beloved Lorenzo de’Medici, who had managed to ruleFlorence for decades without theFlorentines’ feeling the brunt orshame of being ruled. ButLorenzo had died in 1492, and,two years later, the Medici werethrown out of the city.Machiavelli was twenty-five;Giuliano de’ Medici, Lorenzo’syoungest son, was fifteen. WhileMachiavelli had nothing to dowith the religious regime of theDominican preacher Savonarola,who replaced the Medici—hedisdained the preacher’s pious“lies” even while admiring hisrepublican reforms—he came intohis own once the city turnedagainst its savior and Savonarola(after suffering fourteen drops ofthe strappado) was hanged. In1498, when both God andSavonarola’s supporters lost theirgovernment posts, Machiavellifound himself with a job. For thenext fourteen years, he proudlyserved an independent city-statethat had returned to itsrepublican form, but was now

carefully buttressed to withstandMedici forces lurking at itsborders, or the threat that otherwealthy families might pose. Thechief safeguard of the city’s libertywas the Great Council: anadministrative body with amembership of more than threethousand citizens, which gaveFlorence, with a population ofsome fifty thousand, the mostbroadly representativegovernment of its time.

At the age of twenty-nine,Machiavelli was appointedSecond Chancellor, withresponsibilities for the city’scorrespondence and domesticreports. His immense physicaland intellectual energy (hecasually boasted of making“Greek, Latin, Hebraic, andChaldean” references) seems toaccount for his additionalappointment, within a month, asSecretary of the so-called Ten ofWar, which sent him on remotediplomatic missions, usually inthe face of impending crisis. War

was never far off. These wereyears when France, Spain, and theHoly Roman Empire, battlingover rival claims, sent theirformidable armies marchingacross the weak and continuallysparring Italian states; Milan,Genoa, Florence, Venice, Naples,and any number of smallerduchies, marquisates, andrepublics found it hard to defendthemselves, for lack of a unitedfront.

To make matters worse, thevaried Italian powers relied onmercenary troops that tradedsides more easily than today’s big-league ballplayers, signing a newcontract as soon as a better offercame along. Machiavelli thrivedon the urgency and the uproar,filling his saddlebags with booksand galloping off to argue theFlorentine case, then report backon what he had found. In onereport, he described his duties asweighing what the ruler’s“intentions are, what he reallywants, which way his mind is

turning, and what might makehim move ahead or draw back”;he wrote of the need “toconjecture the future throughnegotiations and incidents.” All inall, it seems that he was expectedto bring the gifts of a psychologistto the task of a prophet.

He did it very well. Although hislack of wealth kept him fromachieving the rank of ambassador—officially a mere envoy, hestyled himself, rather grandly, theFlorentine Secretary—hisunblinking judgments made himthe right-hand man of therepublic’s chief official, PieroSoderini. He was set to work atthe courts of King Louis XII ofFrance, Pope Julius II, and theHoly Roman EmperorMaximilian, all the whilestudying the differing forms ofgovernment and temperamentoffered to his view. Like mostpsychologists, Machiavelli wasinsatiably curious about thehuman mind. And no one he metimpressed him more than Cesare

Borgia, the son of the SpanishPope Alexander VI, who was atthe height of his power when, in1502, he received Machiavelli inthe ducal palace of Urbino—bycandlelight, as legend has it,dressed all in black, already afigure of self-consciouslytheatrical menace. Borgia hadrecently conquered Urbino, alongwith a large swath of central Italy,by means of daring, speed, andtreachery. (Machiavelli especiallyadmired a maneuver in whichBorgia had asked the Duke ofUrbino to lend him his artillery tohelp take a nearby town, thenturned on the undefended duchyand took it instead.) Machiavellicould not help but contrastBorgia’s stunning effectivenesswith the frustratingly slow andprudent Florentine republic,which displayed the deficienciesas well as the virtues of the needfor popular consensus, and hewrote excitedly to his bosses inthe Palazzo della Signoria of thelessons offered by this majesticenemy. In the ruthless young

warrior he saw a potential hero: aleader strong enough to expel theforeign armies and transformItaly from a poetic entity into areal one.

The most practical lesson that thedazzled envoy took from Borgiawas the deployment of a citizenarmy. At one point in hiscampaigns, after his hiredmercenaries had conspired againsthim, Borgia had been forced todraft peasants from his conqueredterritories. Machiavelli recognizedthe advantages of such a system,which were made particularlyclear when Florence’s mercenaryarmy, warring against Pisa,ignominiously turned and fledonce the fighting got too rough.Who, after all, was willing to diefor a handful of florins(particularly the meagre handfulpaid by the republic)? On theother hand, who was not willingto die for one’s country? In 1505,Machiavelli argued the case for aFlorentine citizen militia, and ona brisk February day in 1506

several hundred Tuscan farmersparaded through the Piazza dellaSignoria, snappily dressed in red-and-white trousers and whitecaps. Despite the commedia-dell’arte air, just three years laterMachiavelli led a thousandcitizen troops in the latest offifteen years of attacks on Pisa,and—to general astonishment—the Florentines won.

Machiavelli’s military reputationremained sterling until 1512,when the militia, defending theneighboring town of Prato fromSpanish troops, broke ranks andran as shamelessly as the mostcraven mercenaries. Worse, thedefeat left Florence on the losingside of a wider battle betweenFrance and the allied forces ofSpain and Pope Julius II. WithFlorence vulnerable, a long-resentful pro-Medici factionseized its chance, and therepublican government wasoverthrown. And so it happenedthat in September, 1512, after anabsence of eighteen years, the

Medici rode back into the city.Within days, Machiavelli’s militiaand the Great Council weredismissed.

Although Machiavelli soon losthis position as Secretary, he seemsto have believed that hemaintained some authority,writing a formal plea on behalf ofPiero Soderini, whom he hadhelped to escape on the eve of theMedici return. This exceptionaldocument—published for the firsttime in English, as “A Caution tothe Medici,” in “The EssentialWritings of Machiavelli” (editedand translated by PeterConstantine; Modern Library;$17.95)—presents an argumentagainst the Medici faction’scontinued blackening ofSoderini’s name. Machiavellioffers a political rationale (“TheMedici government would onlyweaken itself by attacking a manwho is in exile and cannot harmit”) for what seems an attempt todefend a friend and, in his name,the Florentine people. Of course,

any illusions of influence weredispelled a few months later, inFebruary, 1513, by jail and thestrappado. Whether Giuliano de’Medici ever read the sonnets thatMachiavelli dedicated to him is amatter of dispute, but hisintervention was not ultimatelyrequired. After a month behindbars, Machiavelli was released,thanks to an amnesty grantedupon Cardinal Giovanni de’Medici’s election to the papacy asLeo X, the first Medici pope.(“God has granted us the papacy,”he reportedly told Giuliano. “Letus enjoy it.”) For four days,Florence was alight with prideand the heady prospect of favorsfrom the overflowing papalcoffers: fireworks, bonfires,pealing bells, and cannonades allgreeted the weary formerSecretary as he made his wayhome.

Even now, Machiavelli hopedthat “these new masters of ours”would find his services of use. Hewas experienced, he was (at forty-

three) extremely vigorous, andduring his many years of civilservice he had shown himself atrustworthy man. “My poverty isevidence of my fidelity andvirtue,” he confided to a friend.And he desperately needed a job.That spring, still unemployed, heretreated from the city to livewith his wife and children on thefamily farm, near San Casciano,in taunting view of the tower ofthe Palazzo della Signoria. It wasa sprawling and ramshackle place,and he was sadly out of hiselement, catching birds andplaying cards; his worldly friendssent mocking regards to thechickens. But in the evening,approaching his study, he strippedoff his muddy clothes and put onhis ambassadorial attire. “Fittedout appropriately, I step inside thevenerable courts of the ancients,”he wrote, in one of the mostfamous letters of the Renaissance,“where I am unashamed toconverse with them and toquestion them about the motivesfor their actions, and they, out of

“T“We spent the summer on the Côte de Jersey.”

their human kindness, answerme.” Livy, Cicero, Virgil, Tacitus:he wrote their answers down and,adding observations from thehistory he had witnessed, towardthe end of 1513 he completed alittle book about statecraft—abook of strictly practical matters,dealing with armies andfortresses, with ways of holdingon to power—that he resolvedwould demonstrate his usefulnessonce and for all to Giuliano, sinceit discussed people and theiractions “as they are in real truth,rather than as they are imagined.”Never before or since has a writerso clearly proved that the truth isa dangerous thing.

he Prince,” Machiavelli’show-to guide for

sovereigns, turned out to be “ascandal that Western politicalthought and practice has beengazing at in horror and infascination since its firstpublication,” to quote from AlbertRussell Ascoli’s introduction to

Peter Constantine’s newtranslation (Modern Library; $8;also included in “The EssentialWritings of Machiavelli”).Circulated in manuscript foryears, the book was not publisheduntil 1532—nearly five years afterMachiavelli’s death—and receivedits first significant critique withinthe decade, from an Englishcardinal who pronounced theauthor “an enemy of the humanrace.” Machiavelli stood accusedof having inspired Henry VIII todefy papal authority and seizeecclesiastical power for the crown.Some thirty years later, in France,the book was blamed for incitingQueen Catherine de’ Medici toorder the massacre of twothousand rebel Protestants.(There seems to have been littlebesides her family connection towarrant the Machiavellianassociation.) His notoriety grew,less through knowledge of theoffending book than through themany lurid and often skewedattacks it prompted, with titles onthe order of “Stratagems of

Satan.” Wherever a sovereignusurped power from the churchor the nobility, wheneverostentatious deceit or murderousforce was used, Machiavelli wasspied in the shadows, scribbling athis desk amid the olive groves, hisquill dipped in a poison so potentthat it threatened the powerstructures of Europe.

What caused the furor? Here, outof context and placed end to end(a method not unfamiliar to hisattackers), are some ofMachiavelli’s most salient andsatanic points: “A prince,particularly a new prince, cannotafford to cultivate attributes forwhich men are considered good.In order to maintain the state, aprince will often be compelled towork against what is merciful,loyal, humane, upright, andscrupulous”; “A wise ruler cannotand should not keep his wordwhen it would be to hisdisadvantage”; “Men must beeither flattered or eliminated,because a man will readily avenge

a slight grievance, but not onethat is truly severe”; “A man isquicker to forget the death of hisfather than the loss of hispatrimony.” And, the distilledspirit of this dark brew: “Howone lives and how one ought tolive are so far apart that he whospurns what is actually done forwhat ought to be done willachieve ruin rather than his ownpreservation.” To underscore howshocking such notions were, theyshould be compared with otherexamples from the genre in whichMachiavelli was consciouslyworking: the “Mirrors of Princes,”a type of professional primeroffered by advisers to young orrecently elevated monarchs,meant to shape their judgmentand, with it, the future of thestate. A philosopher could nothope for a more direct influenceon the fate of mankind than bywriting such a book; or,practically speaking, for a betteradvertisement for a royal job.Erasmus, whose “Education of aChristian Prince” was written two

years after Machiavelli’s work—he presented his treatise first toCharles of Aragon and, after itfailed to elicit the desiredfinancial result, to Henry VIII—spun his pious counsel around thecentral thesis “What must beimplanted deeply and before allelse in the mind of the prince isthe best possible understanding ofChrist.” Machiavelli, on the otherhand, proposed the best possibleunderstanding of the methods ofCesare Borgia.

There is a context, however, that,if not ameliorating, is richlycomplicating and easilyoverlooked in the light ofMachiavelli’s aphoristic skill. Onedoesn’t wish to fall back on theexcuse that this is the way thatrulers (or other people) oftenbehave, although it is true thatMachiavelli no more inventedpolitical evil by describing it thanKinsey invented sex. Like all thecelebrated artists of his time andplace—and statecraft was one ofthe Renaissance arts—

Machiavelli was in thrall toancient pagan models. But thereis a crucial difference: a paintercould situate a Madonna within aclassical portico withoutdisturbing the figure’s Christianmeaning. Works that delvebeneath the surface of classicalforms to get at classical thinking—works of literature, philosophy,politics—require a recognition, atleast, of the conflict betweenpagan and Christian ideals:strength versus humility, earthlylife versus the hereafter, the heroversus the saint. For Machiavelli,the choice was not difficult. TheRoman republic was for him theundisputed golden age; evenbefore writing “The Prince,” hehad begun a commentary onLivy’s “History of Rome,” closelyanalyzing the Roman system ofliberty and leaving no doubt thathe was a republican at heart. (“Itis not the particular good but thecommon good that makes citiesgreat. And without doubt thiscommon good is observednowhere but in a republic.”) But

Christian piety had sapped thestrength needed to bring thisheroic form of government backto life. The great republic of hisown era had failed because themen entrusted with its libertiesdid not know how to fight forthem. He had seen his friendSoderini forfeit Florence byrefusing to limit the freedomsultimately employed against himby his enemies; that is, by trustingthat goodness and decency couldtriumph over the implacable vicesand envious designs of men.

This was not Borgia’s defect. Yethe was not a monster, if oneconsidered the question of moralshonestly, in terms of the goodactually accomplished rather thanthe reputation created for oneself.Unafraid of being known forcruelty, Borgia had deposed anumber of petty rulers who wereso weak that robbery and murderhad been rampant in their lands,until—“with a few exemplaryexecutions”—he established peaceand order. Machiavelli asserts that

Borgia had thus proved moregenuinely merciful than theFlorentines, who, guarding theirreputation, had allowed the townof Pistoia to be destroyed byfactional fighting rather thanintervene with their own arms. “Aprince, therefore, must not fearbeing reproached for cruelty,” heconcludes, issuing one of thememorably black-hearted maximsthat do not mean exactly whatthey say. (On the question ofmurdering a few to save a greaternumber, Thomas More took asimilar position in “Utopia,”which followed “The Prince” byjust three years and, giving itsname to the very notion ofpolitical idealism, has stood inmoral counterpoint ever since.)For Machiavelli, cruel andunusual measures were to be usedonly out of necessity, to be endedquickly, and to be converted intobenefits (safety, security, wealth)for the prince’s subjects. Rulerswho perpetrated needless orexcessive cruelties—such as KingFerdinand of Spain, who had

robbed his country’sChristianized Jews and Moors,and then expelled them—arerebuked, no matter what theirachievements may have been.“These means can lead to power,”Machiavelli confirms, and thendeparts from his famous counselof Realpolitik to add, “but notglory.”

So is he in fact a moralist? Or,heaven forbid, a saint?Machiavelli was a very precisewriter, continually reworking hismanuscripts to achieve a stylethat is as clear as daylight.Writing in his native Tuscan-inflected Italian (rather than inthe scholarly Latin commonlyused for significant works), herelied on simple words andexpressions, proud of his freedomfrom the “unnecessary artificewith which so many writers gildtheir work.” One of theconundrums that Machiavelliposes for his readers is that thisverbal clarity lends itself to suchuncertain meaning. Peter

Constantine, who has won manyawards for his staggeringlymultilingual work in translatingChekhov, Thomas Mann,Voltaire, and Sophocles (amongothers), has translated “ThePrince” with the stated intentionof winning its author the status of“a major stylist, a writer ofbeautiful prose.” True, “majorstylist” is rarely one’s first thoughtwhen Machiavelli comes up inconversation. And when a bookhas been translated as often as“The Prince”—there are morethan half a dozen Englishtranslations currently in print—some new claim is expected. Yet,on careful comparison, the moststylistically elegant version of“The Prince” remains GeorgeBull’s nearly fifty-year-oldtranslation, a taut and almostHemingwayesque account ofMachiavelli’s strong republicanprose. (Sample evidence:Constantine renders one ofMachiavelli’s famous sentences,“Since a prince must know howto use the nature of the beast to

his advantage, he must emulateboth the fox and the lion, becausea lion cannot defy a snare, while afox cannot defy a pack of wolves.”Defy a snare? Bull’s less wordyversion is smoother English andalso better mimics the punch ofMachiavelli’s Italian: “So, as aprince is forced to know how toact like a beast, he must learnfrom the fox and the lion; becausethe lion is defenceless againsttraps and a fox is defencelessagainst wolves.”)

A translator’s work is meant to betransparent, providing access to atext without agenda orinterpretation. But the choiceeven of a word can amplify athought in a significant way.Constantine may not provide themost nimbly literary Machiavelli,but he pushes us in the rightpolitical direction when, early in“The Prince,” he offers: “Evenwith the most powerful army, ifyou want to invade a state, youneed the support of the people.”No other version of this line is

quite as democratically ringing,not even Machiavelli’s, whichstates that the success of aninvasion depends on the favore de’provinciali, a phrase rendered byBull as “the goodwill of theinhabitants” and by othertranslators in more or less thesame comparatively pedestrianway. The support of the people:this idea or a near variant—“elpopolo amico,” “la benivolenziapopulare”—occurs throughoutMachiavelli’s little book andslowly gathers weight as the onepossession that the prince cannotafford to be without. Constantineis right to underscore it. Thefollowing observations—whichcould never pass as“Machiavellian”—should beviewed against the author’s morefamously glittering advice: “Aprince must have the people onhis side, otherwise he will nothave support in adverse times”; “Aprince need not worry undulyabout conspiracies when thepeople are well disposed towardhim. But if they are his enemies

and hate him, he must feareverything and everybody.” Andthe forthright climax of thistheme: “The best fortress for theprince is to be loved by hispeople.” Presented as no morethan another component of thebook’s message of self-servingRealpolitik, Machiavelli’s steadydrumming of the lesson that theprince must treat his subjects wellhas an almost subliminal force.Whether the prince turns out tobe a lion or a fox, “The Prince”sets a trap to render him, inrelation to his people, a lamb.

Machiavelli is often credited withthe phrase “The end justifies themeans.” Although he never usedexactly these words, and thenotion appears to date fromGreek tragedy, the implied moralrelativism is essential to his work.Insofar as “The Prince” wasintended as a means to an end,however, it was a failure: there isno evidence that Giuliano de’Medici ever read it, and theFlorentine successor to whom

Machiavelli eventually dedicatedthe book, Giuliano’s despoticnephew Lorenzo, was said to havepreferred the gift of a pair ofhounds. In any case, neitherprince saw fit to offer the author ajob. Within the plan of the bookitself, the final chapter envisionsan end so important—theunification of the Italian states—that it justifies not only whatevermeans must be used to attain itbut whatever language must beused to describe it. The prosesuddenly becomes effusive, lyrical,and determinedly rousing: theverbal equivalent of pennantsflying, trumpets sounding. ForMachiavelli is no longer justifyingor advising but actively urging theprince toward a goal, and it is agoal much larger than personalpower. “Italy, after so many years,must welcome its liberator,” hedeclares. “The love with whichthese lands that have suffered aflood of foreign armies willreceive him will be boundless, aswill be their thirst for vengeance,iron loyalty, their devotion and

“I’m not disappointed—I’m just very, verymad.”

tears. All doors will be flung open.What populace would notembrace such a leader?” Judged asa means to this end, too, “ThePrince” was a failure: it was threehundred and fifty years beforeMachiavelli’s nationalist hopesprevailed. Still, he understoodthat many of his ideas, being soradically new, would meetresistance. Living in the age ofgreat explorers—his assistant inthe Florentine Chancery wasAgostino Vespucci, cousin ofAmerigo—Machiavelli sawhimself as one of their company,with a mission “no less dangerous”than seeking “unknown seas andcontinents.”

To the culture at large, the dangerwas real. “The Prince” offered thefirst major secular shock to theChristianized state in which westill live. Long before Darwin,Machiavelli showed us a credibleworld without Heaven or Hell, aworld of “is” rather than “should

be,” in which men were coollyviewed as related to beasts andearthly government was the onlyhope of bettering our naturalplight. Although his ideas havedrawn sporadic supportthroughout history—amongseventeenth-century Englishanti-monarchists, amongnineteenth-century Germannationalists—it was not until thepresent age that scholars began toseparate the man from his cursedreputation. Roberto Ridolfi’slandmark biography, of 1954,made a passionate case for itssubject’s Italian warmth of spirit.Leo Strauss, a few years later,claimed that Machiavelliintended his most outrageousstatements merely to startle andamuse. And, in full redemption,Sebastian de Grazia’s PulitzerPrize-winning “Machiavelli inHell,” of 1989, argued for thequondam devil’s stature as aprofoundly Christian thinker.There is today an entire school ofpolitical philosophers who seeMachiavelli as an intellectual

“A

freedom fighter, a transmitter ofmodels of liberty from the ancientto the modern world. Yet what ismost astonishing about our age isnot the experts’ desire to correctour view of a maligned historicalfigure but what we have made ofthat figure in his most titillatinglydebased form. “The MafiaManager: A Guide to theCorporate Machiavelli”; “ThePrincessa: Machiavelli forWomen”; and the deliciouslytitled “What Would MachiavelliDo? The Ends Justify theMeanness” represent just afraction of a contemporary, best-selling literary genre. Machiavellimay not have been, in fact, aMachiavellian. But in Americanbusiness and social circles he hascome to stand for the principlethat winning—no matter how—isall. And for this alone, for the firsttime in history, he is a culturalhero.

fter everything was lost”is the way that

Machiavelli referred to the years

after he emerged from prison,failed to regain his job, andlanguished outside the halls ofpower. But even while helamented his fate, and continuedto angle for Medici favor, he wenton writing, almost feverishly, andin a variety of forms. Hecompleted his “Discourses on theFirst Decade of Livy,” a scholarlyode to the republican ideal—JohnAdams loved this book—whichhe seems to have read aloud tofriends in the increasingly anti-Medici circle that gathered in thegardens of the Rucellai palace. Hedevoted himself to poetry,working on classical themes inDantesque terza rima, and hediscovered a gift for the theatre.Most striking, in the midst ofthese dark years, he turned tocomedy. There was the one aboutthe devil who was afraid of hiswife; the one he adapted from theRoman playwright Terence; andthen there was “The Mandrake,”a satiric, bawdy, often scatologicalfarce involving the timeless trio ofaspiring lover, stupid husband,

and venal priest, all conspiring toget a Renaissance Sophia Loreninto bed. It was the greatest hit ofMachiavelli’s career. Although thedate of composition is uncertain—the observation that “here inFlorence, if you’re not in with theruling party . . . you can’t even geta dog to bark at you” describes along-term quandary—we knowthat the play was first put on in1520, in a production sosuccessful that Pope Leo Xordered a command performanceat the papal court later that year.And so, seven years aftereverything was lost, and thanks tothe Pope’s delight in a show thathappily trafficked in adultery andthe shifty morals of the clergy—this in the same year that Leo Xexcommunicated Martin Luther—Machiavelli at last came intoMedici favor, and everything wasmore or less regained.

To succeed in life a man must beadaptable. This is a prime lessonof “The Prince,” and Machiavelliappears to have been determined

to live by it. A republican duringthe republic, a royal servant whenprinces rule: “He who conformshis course of action to the qualityof the times will fare well.” FromLeo X and his cousin Giulio de’Medici—the Archbishop ofFlorence and its de-facto rulersince the death of the despisedLorenzo—Machiavelli nowreceived a commission to write anofficial “History of Florence,” anassignment that placed him indistinguished literary company,and carried the suggestion ofother plum tasks to come. But acorollary, if contradictory, lessonof “The Prince” is that, try as hemight, “man cannot deviate fromthat to which nature inclineshim.” In composing his Medici-commissioned history,Machiavelli agonized over how topresent the Medici, and the resultis anything but the work of acourtier. Recounting how thefamily’s desire to “wield exclusivepower” had led it to crush allpolitical opposition, leaving otherparties with no alternative except

plots and murderous conspiracies,he concluded bluntly that underthe Medici regime “liberty wasunknown in Florence.”

In the matter of conspiracies, in1522 a plot to murder Giulio de’Medici was found to haveoriginated among the learnedcircle of the Rucellai palacegardens. The circle wasdisbanded; Machiavelli’s closestfriends were exiled or beheaded.He, however—in circumstancesvery different from the Mediciconspiracy a decade earlier—wasneither arrested nor implicated.Scholars have agreed with theFlorentine authorities thatMachiavelli knew nothing of theplot; he was too historicallysuspect a figure for his friends torisk including. But Ross King, inhis brief biography “Machiavelli:Philosopher of Power,” points outhow curiously often Machiavelliwrites about political conspiracy,and the overt sympathy withwhich he handles theconspirators; in the portion of the

“History” that Machiavelli wascomposing in 1522, he treats thefifteenth-century ringleader of aplot against the Sforza tyrant ofMilan with the respect due to aRoman republican hero. It isdifficult not to wonder, at least,about Machiavelli’s innocence inthese events. Of course, in 1522there was not a scrap of evidenceagainst him. But then it may havebeen the incriminating scrap of1513 that made him think sohard about the rules by whichconspirators must proceed:confide in absolutely no oneexcept when absolutely necessary,try to leave no one alive whomight be able to take revenge,and, above all, never put anythingin writing.

Even military opportunitiesreturned, when, in 1523, Giuliode’ Medici succeeded to thepapacy as Clement VII. During atime when the pressure of foreignclaims was mounting, Machiavelliwas entrusted with maintainingFlorence’s fortifications. He did

his job enthusiastically—evenecstatically—and well. When, inthe spring of 1527, the Emperor’sarmies thundered south throughItaly, they bypassed the terrifiedcity, judging the walls and fortstoo difficult to breach. Instead,the angry, starving, part-Spanish,part-Lutheran, barely controllablearmy marched directly on toRome, where soldiers pouredthrough the walls and viciouslysacked the city—robbing, raping,murdering, and destroying fordays on end. Machiavelli himselfhelped Clement to escape. But hehad done even more for hisbeloved Florence than he knew,and less for himself. In theensuing chaos, the Medici regimein Florence was overthrown; therepublic was restored; the GreatCouncil was reinstated. This waseverything that Machiavelli hadhoped for even when he appearedto be on the other side. He wasseen not as brilliantly adaptable,however, but simply as on theother side. As a Medici supporter,he found himself once again

O

unemployed, subject to the samesort of political suspicions aswhen the Medici had firstreturned. But, at fifty-eight, he nolonger had the resources to startover. He developed mysteriousstomach ailments and took to hisbed, and within weeks of therepublic’s restoration Machiavellidied, attended by his lovingchildren, his loyal friends, and apriest.

dd, that an expert atwinning should have lost

so much, and then lost it all again.In however perverse a way,Machiavelli was no less a martyrto his convictions than ThomasMore, who was beheaded—andeventually canonized—for hisrefusal to condone the royalpower grab that Henry VIIIpurportedly learned from “ThePrince.” Of course, More had thecourage to stand in opposition tothe moral direction of his times.Machiavelli was his times: hegave permanent form and force toits political habits and unspoken

principles. Although it is oftensaid that modern politics beginswith Machiavelli, most politiciansstill run and hide at the mentionof his name. In 1972, HenryKissinger, the most arguably“Machiavellian” counsellor ofprinces this country has ever seen,recoiled at the insinuation that hehad learned anything from theFlorentine Secretary, stating,“There is very little ofMachiavelli’s one can use in thecontemporary world.” (Kissinger’sonly competitor in this area, KarlRove, is the subject of a newbiography titled “Machiavelli’sShadow.”) Yet we continue toflounder in the break betweenpolitics and ethics thatMachiavelli made impossible toignore: private life and public life;personal morality and Realpolitik.We insist that our leadersconvince us that they areexemplary and (increasingly)God-fearing human beings, whoare nevertheless able to protect usfrom enemies not so constrained.How is this to be done? Do we

really want to know?

Most important, as we emergefrom the century that gave Utopiaa bad name—in which Hitler andStalin and other genocidal princesbelieved they were buildingsuperior worlds, in which themeans was annihilation and theend an illusion—we are stillarguing bitterly over the questionof whether the end justifies themeans. Are there any acts thatone’s sense of honor (orconscience, or ability to sleep atnight) forbid one to commit—asan individual, as a nation—nomatter what the promised end?Machiavelli did not question theuse of torture for politicalpurposes, even after he had beenits victim. “When the very safetyof the country depends upon theresolution to be taken,” he wrotein the “Discourses,” “noconsiderations of justice orinjustice, humanity or cruelty, notof glory or of infamy, should beallowed to prevail.” This hasdoubtless been the tacit position

of many governments throughouthistory; it is openly the positionof a large segment of ourgovernment now, with Vice-President Cheney warning of theneed for going to “the dark side”in dealing with terrorist suspects,and Attorney General Mukaseyundecided about which methodsof “enhanced” interrogationconstitute torture. There is noquestion, however, about themethod used on Machiavelli, thestrappado—also known today as“Palestinian hanging”—whichwas responsible for the death ofan Iraqi detainee in C.I.A.custody at Abu Ghraib in 2003:the prisoner was suspended by hisarms, which had been shackledbehind his back, and died ofasphyxiation. Private moralitymay be presumed to prevail againwhen the country is strong andsecure, although Machiavelli,unlike those who offer suchconsolation, admitted that thenature of mankind makes itunlikely that there ever will besuch a time. “I love my country

Claudia Roth Pierponthas been a contributorto The New Yorkersince 1990 and becamea staff writer in 2004.

more than my own soul,”Machiavelli wrote, yet a fullassessment of his work makesthat decision far from clear. Then,as now, it is a terrible choice. ♦