Machiavelli on Cruelty and Compassion
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) was interested in self-reliance, self-preservation and self-promotion. These things motivated his writing of The Prince and these were its themes. His aim was to impart to the ruling Prince, Lorenzo dé Medici (1492–1519) what he had learned of these components of statecraft and, in doing so, so impress him that he would return to political favour and to his previous role as a trusted Florentine diplomat. (He had previously fallen from favour when his name had been discovered on a list of those who might be sympathetic to a plot against the Medicis.)
For Machiavelli was not interested in self-preservation alone; he was interested in returning to the political stage. Only there, where there was opportunity to impress, did he feel fully appreciated and fully alive. He assumed the same was true of the Prince but whereas Machiavelli had to impress the Prince in order to return to power, he was well aware that the Prince had to impress his subjects in order to maintain power.
Most political treatises failed to take this into account. They made the mistake of looking at the state as a purely abstract construct. As a consequence their practical use was very limited and some were so removed from reality that from a practical viewpoint they were detrimental.
Machiavelli was determined to avoid this mistake and to write about politics as actually practised and so to write a book with advice that would actually be helpful. In his words:
Many have dreamed up republics and principalities which have never in truth been known to exist; the gulf between how one should live and how one does live is so wide that a man who neglects what is actually done for what should be done moves towards self-destruction rather than self-preservation. The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous. Therefore if a prince wants to maintain his rule he must be prepared not to be virtuous, and to make use of this or not according to need. (Machiavelli 2003: 50)1
For Machiavelli, political survival is an ambition that exists for its own sake. There is no more lofty ambition. For there is nothing inspiring about humanity
One can make this generalization about men: they are ungrateful, fickle, liars and deceivers, they shun danger and are greedy for profit; while you treat them well, they are yours. They would shed their blood for you, risk their property, their lives, their sons, so long … as the danger is remote; but when you are in danger they turn away. (Machiavelli 2003: 54)
Finding humanity uninspiring, if not repugnant, the entire sum of Machiavelli’s recommendations is therefore entirely and unashamedly egotistical. It is a philosophy that has no time for compassion, only, occasionally, for its appearance. Machiavelli holds this view consistently throughout The Prince and ever since its posthumous publication in 1532 it is this view that has led to Machiavelli’s notoriety. Some have seen him as merely pragmatic, a master of realpolitik, whereas others have seen him as, simply, evil.
In general, those who have seen Machiavelli as merely pragmatic have tended to bring to bear evidence from his other works such as his Discourses on Livy (1531) whereas those who have seen him as evil have concentrated upon The Prince, and particularly upon Chapter 17 on ‘Cruelty and Compassion; and whether it is better to be loved than feared, or the reverse.’ In this chapter Machiavelli argues that, although a reputation for compassion can be beneficial, so too can a reputation for cruelty.
From this there arises the following question: whether it is better to be loved or feared, or the reverse. The answer is that one would like to be both the one and the other; but because it is difficult to combine them, it is far better to be feared than loved if you cannot be both … Men worry less about doing an injury to one who makes himself loved than to one who makes himself feared. For love is secured by a bond of gratitude which men, wretched creatures that they are, break when it is to their advantage to do so; but fear is strengthened by a dread of punishment which is always effective. (Machiavelli 2003: 54)
One of the fascinating aspects of Machiavelli’s Prince, illustrated in these passages, is that although we may intuitively recoil from such ruthless misanthropic egotism, it appears to be built upon sound reasoning.
Nonetheless, there is a flaw in his argument. Recall that, in reference to the abstractions of previous political philosophy, Machiavelli says that: “The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous” (Machiavelli 2003: 50). On this point, with certain principled moral dogmatists brought to mind, we might agree with him. But he then reasons: “Therefore if a prince wants to maintain his rule he must be prepared not to be virtuous …” (ibid.) He trades on the ambiguity of this claim: “not to be virtuous” sometimes or “not to be virtuous” ever?
We might nod along to this sentence because it is hardly controversial to claim that we must be prepared not to be virtuous sometimes (in the sense of not dogmatically maintaining abstract principles of virtue). But what Machiavelli actually means is that the Prince must be “prepared not to virtuous” (in any conventional sense) ever. And it is this claim that underpins the rest of his argument in which we discover that the only sense of virtue that the Prince must cultivate is the skill of realpolitik.
However, if we agree with Machiavelli that because abstract moral and political principles are not always sufficient in practice we are not compelled to infer that we should give up all of our conventional ideas of virtue. Moreover, even if these abstract principles are all insufficient in practice, it is worth remembering that not all of our conventional ideas of virtue are derived from abstract principles.
Thus, for instance, when we find we cannot be virtuous according to abstract principles, we can still be guided by compassion. However, compassion as a guide to conduct is not something that Machiavelli considers. He closed off that option when, having assumed that all notions of virtue are derived from abstract principles, he then rejected abstract principles.
Of course compassion alone may not tell us exactly what to do, although sometimes it does; and sometimes – “Because I am involved in mankind”2 – it is compassion that warns us that our abstract principles have gone astray. In that respect, it is something like an essential, pre-theoretical, moral compass. Without it we are liable to be – like Machiavelli and his ideal Prince – cruel, self-isolated and alone.
Stephen Leach (formerly at Keele University, UK) writes on themes in philosophy, archaeology, art history and human evolution.
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