feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/shmoop/The Prince/section_16_part_0.txt
feat_book_id: The Prince.chapter 16
feat_summary_id: chapter 16
feat_summary: {"name": "Chapter 16", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-16", "summary": "Machiavelli's rule number 670,979,843,101: Don't be generous. It's not worth it. We know you want to seem awesome and have everyone think that you're the best ruler ever, but seriously, don't. You will waste all of your money and your people will hate you because you have to raise taxes. Funnily enough, you can seem generous by not spending any money because everyone will be happy that you didn't tax them. Old Niccolo likes to back up his claims with examples, if you haven't noticed already. This time, he says it worked out for Pope Julius II, The King of France, and the King of Spain, so it can work for you! Anyway, if people are upset with you for not giving them presents, ignore them. Oh, unless it's other people's stuff. If it's other people's stuff then feel free to throw money everywhere. Actually you have to. Otherwise, everyone will hate you, and that means that they might rebel against you.", "analysis": ""}
text: 
  Commencing then with the first of the above-named characteristics, I say
  that it would be well to be reputed liberal. Nevertheless, liberality
  exercised in a way that does not bring you the reputation for it,
  injures you; for if one exercises it honestly and as it should be
  exercised, it may not become known, and you will not avoid the reproach
  of its opposite. Therefore, any one wishing to maintain among men the
  name of liberal is obliged to avoid no attribute of magnificence; so
  that a prince thus inclined will consume in such acts all his property,
  and will be compelled in the end, if he wish to maintain the name
  of liberal, to unduly weigh down his people, and tax them, and do
  everything he can to get money. This will soon make him odious to his
  subjects, and becoming poor he will be little valued by any one; thus,
  with his liberality, having offended many and rewarded few, he is
  affected by the very first trouble and imperilled by whatever may be the
  first danger; recognizing this himself, and wishing to draw back from
  it, he runs at once into the reproach of being miserly.
  
  Therefore, a prince, not being able to exercise this virtue of
  liberality in such a way that it is recognized, except to his cost, if
  he is wise he ought not to fear the reputation of being mean, for in
  time he will come to be more considered than if liberal, seeing that
  with his economy his revenues are enough, that he can defend himself
  against all attacks, and is able to engage in enterprises without
  burdening his people; thus it comes to pass that he exercises liberality
  towards all from whom he does not take, who are numberless, and meanness
  towards those to whom he does not give, who are few.
  
  We have not seen great things done in our time except by those who have
  been considered mean; the rest have failed. Pope Julius the Second was
  assisted in reaching the papacy by a reputation for liberality, yet he
  did not strive afterwards to keep it up, when he made war on the King of
  France; and he made many wars without imposing any extraordinary tax on
  his subjects, for he supplied his additional expenses out of his long
  thriftiness. The present King of Spain would not have undertaken or
  conquered in so many enterprises if he had been reputed liberal. A
  prince, therefore, provided that he has not to rob his subjects, that he
  can defend himself, that he does not become poor and abject, that he
  is not forced to become rapacious, ought to hold of little account
  a reputation for being mean, for it is one of those vices which will
  enable him to govern.
  
  And if any one should say: Caesar obtained empire by liberality, and
  many others have reached the highest positions by having been liberal,
  and by being considered so, I answer: Either you are a prince in
  fact, or in a way to become one. In the first case this liberality is
  dangerous, in the second it is very necessary to be considered liberal;
  and Caesar was one of those who wished to become pre-eminent in Rome;
  but if he had survived after becoming so, and had not moderated his
  expenses, he would have destroyed his government. And if any one should
  reply: Many have been princes, and have done great things with armies,
  who have been considered very liberal, I reply: Either a prince spends
  that which is his own or his subjects' or else that of others. In the
  first case he ought to be sparing, in the second he ought not to neglect
  any opportunity for liberality. And to the prince who goes forth with
  his army, supporting it by pillage, sack, and extortion, handling that
  which belongs to others, this liberality is necessary, otherwise he
  would not be followed by soldiers. And of that which is neither yours
  nor your subjects' you can be a ready giver, as were Cyrus, Caesar, and
  Alexander; because it does not take away your reputation if you squander
  that of others, but adds to it; it is only squandering your own that
  injures you.
  
  And there is nothing wastes so rapidly as liberality, for even whilst
  you exercise it you lose the power to do so, and so become either poor
  or despised, or else, in avoiding poverty, rapacious and hated. And a
  prince should guard himself, above all things, against being despised
  and hated; and liberality leads you to both. Therefore it is wiser to
  have a reputation for meanness which brings reproach without hatred,
  than to be compelled through seeking a reputation for liberality to
  incur a name for rapacity which begets reproach with hatred.
  
  
  
  
feat_summary_name: Chapter 16
target: Machiavelli's rule number 670,979,843,101: Don't be generous. It's not worth it. We know you want to seem awesome and have everyone think that you're the best ruler ever, but seriously, don't. You will waste all of your money and your people will hate you because you have to raise taxes. Funnily enough, you can seem generous by not spending any money because everyone will be happy that you didn't tax them. Old Niccolo likes to back up his claims with examples, if you haven't noticed already. This time, he says it worked out for Pope Julius II, The King of France, and the King of Spain, so it can work for you! Anyway, if people are upset with you for not giving them presents, ignore them. Oh, unless it's other people's stuff. If it's other people's stuff then feel free to throw money everywhere. Actually you have to. Otherwise, everyone will hate you, and that means that they might rebel against you.