Humanities & Classics 1002
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Renaissance Forum
Humanities & Classics 1002 |
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The basic thing that "The Courtier" and "The Prince" have in common is in an essence, exactly the same way that the two authors think leaders should be. They both agree that leaders should be a multitude of different personalities that all intertwine into one whole leader, one that people respect, and perhaps fear, Machiavelli seems to like leaders that are somewhat feared because it then lets the subjects of the leaders respect them because of the power that they have, the way that they can totally change the whole of society with just one decision, the way that they can put to death all those that don't fear them, and who could perhaps summon the audacity to go against the leaders wishes. A leader is someone who is either despised or hailed as great. Machiavelli makes his point time and time again that one should not do things to make his subjects hate him, if they hate him he hasn't really much of a chance, someone will "do him in" just to be rid of him, to have your subjects hate you, in Machiavelli's mind is just stupid, and in "The Courtier" it's stated that if you have the respect of all for the powers that you have and the way that in you wield them, then you command all without much challenge. A true leader just has to have a certain type of charisma and knowledge, and he has to be shrewd, he has to be able to envision what can and perhaps will occur in the future and how to react to this, and instead of merely surviving these changes of power or whatever, the leader must overcome, and even try to benefit from the change in any way that he can, this could occur by having some new allies or by finding a nation to be so weakened that it would be an easy thing to take over and control. Machiavelli recognizes also, though, that a leader can really not totally live up to the whole blend of characteristics, and in spite of this he thinks that people can still be good leaders, but certain vices are what destroy these leaders and lose for them all that they might have gained, among the things that they could lose is also their life, as was portrayed by Machiavelli, this wasn't all that uncommon. I think that the main point that both authors were making is totally obvious in that to be a leader one must have certain attributes of character in order to be obeyed and successful, and that lacking in any of these areas in any way that would be totally recognized by anyone looking for a weakness is what eventually can (and does) lead to the loss of all that the leader has worked for and/or gained.