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How Does Machiavelli Condone Any Strategy To Attain And Maintain Power

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1. What does Machiavelli mean by Fortune? How does this relate to a prince and to the public at large?
Machiavelli talks about fortune as a means to rise to power. He implies that fortune is a form of luck that without will of the person controls half of that person’s actions. When talking about fortune, he talks about free will which supposedly controls the other half although fortune directly correlate with a prince’s success or failure. when he says that “to one who governs himself with caution and patience, times and affairs converge in such a way that his administration is successful, his fortune is made; but if times and affairs change, he is ruined if he does not change his course of action” (123). He further explains how fortune is something that varies from person to person and that a prince in order to maintain power, must change with the varying circumstances and time otherwise, he could meet his ruin, but if he manages to do so, will remain successful.
2. Does Machiavelli condone any strategy to attain and maintain power? Why or why not? …show more content…
In that case, “you should try to be feared rather than loved because it is safer in that “love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails” (80). If a prince is unable to attain both fear and love, then if he has fear to the extent that he is not hated, then at least he is able to maintain his power.
3. What are Machiavelli's top four characteristics of a successful prince? Do you think that these are reasonable? Why or why

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