Falcon
Permabanned
- Joined
- Sep 26, 2010
- Messages
- 46
- MBTI Type
- ENTJ
- Enneagram
- 8w7
Have truer words ever been spoken?
Yes, but Machiavelli is only correct for the emotional part of ruling. He does not say much about the logical part. His writings are not sufficiently precise and clear, and while they may talk about the truth of feelings, they omit logic to a point that his writings could corrupt the mind of some leaders. Frederick the Great wrote an "Anti-Machiavelli" book for that matter, because he considered Machiavelli's writing to be a danger greater to humanity than epidemics.
The reason why I'm saying this is that it is not directly fear - it is justice which indirectly inspires fear of retribution if the rules are broken. A better term would be respect. Fear without fairness breeds rebellion. Just using the word "fear" without precising what I have said makes Machiavelli prone to misinterpretation. The issue is probably not with his original ideas, but with the lack of precision in language used that can make him easily misunderstood.
Finally, is it better to be feared than to be loved? It is irrelevant: it is better to be respected.