the-prince

able man to fix firmly his roots in the states which the arms
and fortunes of others had bestowed on him.
[*] Francesco Sforza, born 1401, died 1466. He married Bianca
Maria Visconti, a natural daughter of Filippo Visconti,
the Duke of Milan, on whose death he procured his own elevation
to the duchy. Machiavelli was the accredited agent
of the Florentine Republic to Cesare Borgia (1478-1507)
during the transactions which led up to the assassinations
of the Orsini and Vitelli at Sinigalia, and along with his letters
to his chiefs in Florence he has left an account, written
ten years before ‘The Prince,’ of the proceedings of the duke
in his ‘Descritione del modo tenuto dal duca Valentino nello
ammazzare Vitellozzo Vitelli,’ etc., a translation of which
is appended to the present work.
Because, as is stated above, he who has not first laid his
foundations may be able with great ability to lay them afterwards,
but they will be laid with trouble to the architect
and danger to the building. If, therefore, all the steps taken
by the duke be considered, it will be seen that he laid solid
foundations for his future power, and I do not consider it
superfluous to discuss them, because I do not know what
better precepts to give a new prince than the example of his
actions; and if his dispositions were of no avail, that was
not his fault, but the extraordinary and extreme malignity
of fortune.
Alexander the Sixth, in wishing to aggrandize the duke,
his son, had many immediate and prospective difficulties.
Firstly, he did not see his way to make him master of any
state that was not a state of the Church; and if he was will-
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