It is refreshing to turn from those chapters in which Machiavelli teaches the Prince how to cope with the world by using the vices of the wicked, to his exposition of the military organization suited to the maintenance of a great kingdom.  Machiavelli has no mean or humble ambition for his Prince:  ’double will his glory be, who has founded a new realm, and fortified and adorned it with good laws, good arms, good friends, and good ensamples.’  What the enterprise to which he fain would rouse Lorenzo really is, will appear in the conclusion.  Meanwhile he encourages him by the example of Ferdinand the Catholic to gird his loins up for great enterprises.  He bids him be circumspect in his choice of secretaries, seeing that ’the first opinion formed of a prince and of his capacity is derived from the men whom he has gathered round him.’  He points out how he should shun flattery and seek respectful but sincere advice.  Finally he reminds him that a prince is impotent unless he can command obedience by his arms.  Fortresses are a doubtful source of strength; against foreign foes they are worse than useless; against subjects they are worthless in comparison with the goodwill of the people:  ’the best fortress possible is to escape the hatred of your subjects.’  Everything therefore depends upon the well-ordering of a national militia.  The neglect of that ruined the princes of Italy and enabled Charles VIII. to conquer the fairest of European kingdoms with wooden spurs and a piece of chalk.[2]

[1] In the Discorsi, lib. i. cap. 55, he calls Italy ’la coruttela del mondo,’ and judges that her case is desperate; ’non si puo sperare nelle provincie che in questi tempi si veggono corrotte, come e l’ Italia sopra tutte le altre.’

    [2] The references in this paragraph are made to chapters
    xx.-xxiv. and chapter xii. of the Principe.

In his discourse on armies Machiavelli lays it down that the troops with which a prince defends his state are either his own, or mercenaries, or auxiliaries, or mixed.  ’Mercenary and auxiliary forces are both useless and perilous, and he who founds the security of his dominion on the former will never be established firmly:  seeing that they are disunited, ambitious, and undisciplined, without loyalty, truculent to their friends, cowardly among foes; they have no fear of God, no faith with men; you are only safe with them before they are attacked; in peace they plunder you; in war you are the prey of your enemies.  The cause of this is that they have no other love nor other reason to keep the field, beyond a little pay, which is far from sufficient to make them wish to die for you.  They are willing enough to be your soldiers so long as you are at peace, but when war comes their impulse is to fly or sneak away.  It ought to be easy to establish the truth of this assertion, since the ruin of Italy is due to nothing else except this, that we have now for many years