Preview

Machiavelli vs. Castiglione

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1540 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Machiavelli vs. Castiglione
Ideas on the same topic always seem to differ from person to person. This holds true to the ideas of Machiavelli and Castiglione. The Prince, written by Machiavelli, and The Courtier, written by Castiglione, are both somewhat how-to guides for nobility, royalty, and princes. However, there are many distinct differences among the ideas of Castiglione and Machiavelli. Castiglione's philosophy leads down the path of a well-rounded person; a more peaceful manner. Machiavelli's philosophy is more straightforward and violent, where you should do anything and everything you have to do in order to achieve your goal. Both books and figures were of great importance to society.
Machiavelli's philosophy was that "The end justifies the means." This meant that the end result is the most important, and how you got there was of no importance. The Prince was a book of advice to rules on how to found a state and how to stay in power. Machiavelli explained in his book the many different ways to gain power. One way was to acquire land. The four methods that he discusses to acquire more land is: Your own arms and virtue, fortune, others' arms, and inequity. To Machiavelli, the word virtue meant manliness and strength. Machiavelli also advocates the use of evil to achieve any goals. He gives an example of Agathocles of Syracuse as a proof that this works and will enable the prince to rule the land peacefully through fear. "Born of a potter, this one always had an iniquitous life throughout his years: nonetheless, he accomplished his iniquities with such virtue of spirit and of body that, having joined the militia, he rose through its ranks to become praetor of Syracuse. Being established in rank, and having decided to become prince and to keep with violence and without obligation to others what had been conceded him by agreement... ...one morning he convened the people and the senate of Syracuse, as if he had had to deliberate things pertinent to the republic; and at a preordained nod

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Machiavelli believes that a government should be very structured, controlled, and powerful. He makes it known that the only priorities of a prince are war, the institutions, and discipline. His writings describes how it is more important for a prince to be practical than moral. This is shown where he writes, "in order to maintain the state he is often obliged to act against his promise, against charity, against humanity, and against religion" (47). In addition, Machiavelli argues that a prince may have to be cunning and deceitful in order to maintain political power. He takes the stance that it is better for the prince to be feared than loved. His view of how a government should run and his unethical conduct are both early signs of dictatorship.…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Machiavelli and Lao-Tzu have very different aspects about how a prince should govern his people. Machiavelli dwells over the fact, whether it is better to be loved or feared. He believes that the…

    • 839 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Machiavelli was an author and an aspiring political figure who had a strong influence on several aspects of Europe’s government. Due to his critical writings in The Prince, many historians see Machiavelli as a cruel and diabolical political figure whose true intentions were to gain power for himself. However, after looking further into Machiavelli’s political past, one can see that Machiavelli is in fact an intelligent man who possesses a hidden motive to write his novel. In his work, he covered several topics that were used by future city-state leaders to help them become successful. Machiavelli proves to be an astute political mind who used his political experience to assess the actions of famous princes and to write The Prince as a noteworthy…

    • 931 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    People who wanted fame and power in this new world of humanism and self-righteousness had to deserve it. No longer did a supreme authority, such as the pope, appoint officials and leaders. The authority rested in the hands of the person willing to take charge. This approach to gaining wealth and power can be described as Machivellian, named so by the influence of ideologist Niccolo Machiavelli. Machiavelli wrote one of the most influential political books of all time, called the Prince, which is considered the most lasting work on Italian Renaissance. In his novel, Machiavelli writes of " cruelty, well used or badly used," and warns the compassionate and humanistic prince "not to make bad use of this compassion".(Burke p.196) Machiavelli expanded on his belief in the Prince, that Italians should behave with ferocity when it comes to politics, and should back up that ferocity with a unified force. Machiavelli's principles have had a profound effect on the way Europe and the rest of the world have viewed politics over centuries, and truly show the Rennaissance's uncanny trait of promoting individualism and social Darwinism.<br><br>The Italian Renaissance has made a major impact on the rest of Europe, leaving an intellectual and artistic heritage that…

    • 1794 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    War, Politics, Castiglione, and Machiavelli During the Renaissance period, many great minds expressed their ideas and talents to their fullest potential. Neither Baldesar Castiglione nor Niccoló Machiavelli were exceptions. In Castiglione?s greatest work, The Book of the Courtier, he describes the qualities that should be possessed by the perfect courtier in a compilation of made-up conversations between the members of the court of Urbino. In arguably Machiavelli?s best work, The Prince, he sets a number of guidelines that, in his opinion, prospective leaders should follow in order to achieve ?greatness? as a ruler. After studying both of these important pieces, one can clearly see that Castiglione and Machiavelli do indeed possess their own specific views concerning war and politics. If each read the other?s book, Castiglione and Machiavelli would definitely have a response to the advice of one another regarding the topics purpose of war, how fair and honest a ruler should be to his people, and what the most effective type of government is.…

    • 988 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Church said things must be done a certain way and people must behave a certain way but Machiavelli argued that we shouldn’t let god solely control our lives and to live for once and take matters into your own hands creating your own destiny. The Prince is one big idea of the way things should be and presented views of humanism and the Catholic Church dogma that are backed by lessons in history that Machiavelli used to demonstrating the way a ruler should lead in regards to government. The Prince says argues not only individuality but collectivism in humans as a…

    • 760 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Overall, Machiavelli shows that in order to be an effective prince, one must disregard the morality of one’s actions in certain times for the welfare of the state. This strong belief shows that Machiavelli’s best interests are in the state and not in the general population. Because he…

    • 358 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Introduction: Many people who have read The Prince by Niccoló Machiavelli were appalled by Machiavelli’s fierce and authorative tone he used to assert his ideas, especially his concept of how the ends justify the means, which slowly made people begin to criticize him and his book as immoral, wicked, and evil. For this reason, Machiavelli began to be insulted as a ruthless and evil person, or in the adopted term, a Machiavellian. Machiavelli didn’t wish to care for morals or spiritual integrity; however, he didn’t arrange to establish the approach to wickedness. As a matter of fact, he argues that the concept the ends justify the means are meant to be followed, but only when necessary commands for it to happen.…

    • 2621 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Machiavelli Paper

    • 599 Words
    • 3 Pages

    If I were a prince during the time of Machiavelli, then his methods would be very useful because power was constantly being moved. If I wanted my power to last then I would want to be cunning and feared. His methods of being devious and deceiving are perfect for winning battles and maintaining a city.…

    • 599 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Machiavelli repeated himself numerous times throughout the piece. The purpose of this was to relay the importance of the advice given. To illustrate this point, Machiavelli says that if a prince wants his people to respect him, he must “keep his hands off the property and the women of his citizens and his subjects.”, in paragraph 15. In paragraph 25, he reiterates the same concept of not being rapacious. He says, “As I have said, what makes him hates above all else is being rapacious and a usurper of the property and the women of his subjects;”. Another example, is to not worry about what the masses call you. Machiavelli says this multiple times with different adjectives attached. Machiavelli informs the reader that a prince must not worry about being called things such as a miser, cruel or cheap as long as it is for the good of the state. By repeating the concept, Machiavelli shows that if a prince is doing what is right as he should, there is no need to fret upon names one is called. Machiavelli is very successsful in reaching his point through repetition, it drilled the ideas into the minds of the readers.…

    • 632 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Machiavelli intended The Prince to serve as a guide to creating and holding on to a principality. In it, he also characterizes a "good" society and the necessary tools for building one. Although Machiavelli conceives the republic as being the most practical form of government, he reasons that it is still possible to create a good society under a monarchy, as long as the leader of the monarchy follows the stipulated guidelines. Machiavelli realized that humans are predisposed to act perniciously and therefore it is the responsibility of the prince to exploit that nature in a way that will benefit society as a whole. In this way, Machiavelli's prince is an ideal crafted from the actual, rather than an actual crafted from the ideal.…

    • 1111 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Prince

    • 436 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The advice Machiavelli gives in chapters fifteen through nineteen is for princes to be basically be bad rather than a good prince. Machiavelli’s advice went against all traditional advice books written for rulers that were all about princes being good, honest, and generous because he did not want to discuss imaginary things.…

    • 436 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Both St. Augustine and Machiavelli believed that in order to understand the true nature of society you must see men for what they truly were. Augustine and Machiavelli are similar in their pessimistic views toward human nature, looking at human self-love and self-interest and believed it to be full of evil, cruelty, betrayal, violence and tied that relationship into the creation of war. For both philosophers a good society is actually something that for almost all men is an unreachable attribute that can only be written about and not actually fully experienced in my view. For Augustine I feel it is a truly heavenly earth where all men are divine and are as close to the city of Heaven as you can be on earth. For Machiavelli it is a state of complete acceptance of each man’s role and how that role fits into society like a puzzle piece. In order to examine each philosopher’s view further, we must break their thoughts into three separate categories which are: human nature, political authority, and religious beliefs. This essay will take an in-depth look at both St. Augustine and Machiavelli, compare and contrast their views, and provide evidence that on some level the two thinkers were very similar in their ideology.…

    • 2815 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Reading the books of Machiavelli’s: The Prince and The Discourses I noticed there are many similarities to one another. Machiavelli explains the concept of an ideal ruler that he thinks would be able to govern with great power and adversity from his observation of previous rulers. The Prince is a book written about Tyrants while The Discourses is a book written by lovers of liberty (The Prince, Introduction- pg XXIII).…

    • 1712 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Machiavelli Vs Hobbes

    • 690 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The two have the same theory but they have different views of morality in governance about the ruler/sovereign which entails the disagreement of the two. Machiavelli Quote One In this paragraph I will be looking at the quote, “Whether it be better to be loved than feared or feared than loved? It may be answered that one should wish to be both, but, because it is difficult to unite them in one person, it is much safer to be feared than loved, when, of the two, either must be dispensed with”( direct quote from text). What I believe that Machiavelli means with regards to this quote is the sacrifice it takes to be a good leader.…

    • 690 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays