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Machiavelli and Human Nature

3 Pages 683 Words February 2015

Niccolo Machiavelli was an Italian politician, philosopher, writer and humanist during the Renaissance. However, Machiavelli was somewhat different from the other humanists in his time. Machiavelli’s view of human nature drastically contradicts what most humanists believed. Unlike Machiavelli, most humanists of the Renaissance strongly believed that each individual played an extremely important role in society. Conversely, Machiavelli had a very negative view on human nature and was quick to mock it. In fact, the central message of many of his writings was based on the faults of mankind. In The Prince, one of Machiavelli’s most famous works, he openly tells his audience of the countless number of negative traits that are inherent among human beings in general. 
Machiavelli had an exceptionally cynical view on the inherent nature of humans. He truly thought that overall, humans were not willing to serve their country unless to directly benefit themselves. Machiavelli believed that the common people are only interested in their own well-being and that they will “break at every chance of their own profit” (Machiavelli 35). Machiavelli then continues to question the true loyalty of citizens and tells the Prince that because “[men] are bad and do not keep their promises to you, you likewise do not have to keep yours to them” (Machiavelli 36). He generalizes men by stating that they are “ungrateful, changeable, simulators and dissimulators, runaways in danger, eager for gain” liars who are motivated only by their own selfishness (Machiavelli 35). Machiavelli presents these traits, as well as many others, as evidence to support his own skeptical view of the nature of humans.
In general, I tend to disagree with Machiavelli’s views on human nature. While it is obviously true that some humans do in fact possess the unfortunate qualities that Machiavelli mentions in The Prince, it is unfair and simply untrue to say that thi...

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