The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli

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Based from the first ten chapters, I can sense that Machiavelli have a keen sense of leadership and the citizens which he rules. Though he sounded too bad or authoritative, I believe that at some point some leaders have to be a bit cold in order for his subjects to follow him.

The Prince is a must read to all politicians, leaders and aspiring leaders. This book simply wants to point out several key points on effective leadership. I think what Machiavelli wants us to know through this book, is that knowing the simple things from terms to application itself is very important in order for us to become effective and good leaders may it be of a country or of a small state. He also gave out several methods and gave examples to which situations is suits best. In most chapters, Machiavelli uses several of examples to demonstrate what to do and what not to do in a given situation. I also liked how Machiavelli used Alexander the Great as good example of both successful and unsuccessful leadership. Even through the years, this book is still relevant and useful even to today’s modern world. This shows that an effective leader is ready for whatever challenge or problems they may soon later face. That he should be already ready ahead of time.

This book implies that Machiavelli just wanted to describe a leader which he views as ideal and fit to be called “The Prince”. This is a book worth reading most especially to those who are very much interested in learning and be more knowledgeable on political science, qualities of a leader and to those who want to be more enlightened and aware of politics. This book also is guide on how a prince or a leader should be the best of all the best possible. He used historical events, metaphors, principles, characters and real life situation in order to display and explain what a prince is. He has been consistent throughout the book and I like how he constructed the whole book.

I think one of his aims or goals why he wrote this book is because maybe he wanted people who read this to be able to open their minds and be more aware so they won’t regret anything in the end. He also wants to point out that loyalty and respect to a leader is very important in order for their place to work all together. Upon reading this book, I believe it will have a great effect most especially to political leaders.

I see Machiavelli as a realist. I believe that he believes that it is all about power in the political aspect. He applied very well realism to politics in terms of this book. He also showed very clearly how a realist he is through his authoritative tone and how he wrote his book.

There has been one quotation from the book which goes, “People are by nature changeable. It is easy to persuade them about some particular matter, but it is hard to hold them to that persuasion. Hence it is necessary to provide that when they no longer believe, they can be forced to believe.” This was taken from Chapter 6. I’d like to agree for a fact that people are being changed through nature or through their environment. That as time goes by there are certain things that changes people most especially when the environment changes as well. People are just like seasons. One day it’s winter then the next it’s summer. This I believe has been proven even way back centuries ago.

Machiavelli’s book can be mistaken as evil, I can say. Maybe because of the kind of tone he used to illustrate the prince, how he explained and illustrated it. But let’s face it, though it was criticized like that he still made sense in everything he wrote in that book.