{{cquote|''A prince has never lacked legitimate reasons to justify his breach of faith. ...But it is necessary to know how to disguise this nature well and how to pretend and dissemble. Men are so simple and so ready to follow the needs of the moment that the deceiver will always find someone to deceive. ...So a prince need not have all the aforementioned good qualities, but it is most essential that he appear to have them. Indeed, I should go so far as to say that having them and always practising them is harmful, while seeming to have them is useful. It is good to appear clement, trustworthy, human, '''religious''', and honest, and also to be so, but always with the mind so disposed that, when the occasion arises not to be so, you can become the opposite. ... a prince should stick to the path of good but, if the necessity arises, he should know how to follow evil.''}}
{{Cquote|''A man who aspires to be good all the time must of necessity come to grief among so many who are so bad.''}}
{{Cquote|''There never was a new prince who has disarmed his subjects; rather when he has found them disarmed he has always armed them, because, by arming them, those arms become yours, those men who were distrusted become faithful, and those who were faithful are kept so, and your subjects become your adherents. And whereas all subjects cannot be armed, yet when those whom you do arm are benefited, the others can be handled more freely, and this difference in their treatment, which they quite understand, makes the former your dependents, and the latter, considering it to be necessary that those who have the most danger and service should have the most reward, excuse you. But when you disarm them, you at once offend them by showing that you distrust them, either for cowardice or for want of loyalty, and either of these opinions breeds hatred against you.''<ref>Chapter 20, section 2.</ref>}}
====Impact of ''The Prince''====