Guicciardini Quotes

#1. There was, it is said, a criminal in Italy who was suffered to make his choice between Guicciardini and the galleys. He chose the history. But the war of Pisa was too much for him; he changed his mind, and went to the oars.

Thomas B. Macaulay

#2. The success of very important matters often depends on doing or not doing something that seems trivial. Even in little things, therefore, you must be cautious and thoughtful. Francesco Guicciardini

Bohdi Sanders

#3. In our corrupt times, the virtue of a Pontiff is commended when he does not surpass the wickedness of other men. - Francesco Guicciardini, History of Italy, 1561

Christopher Buckley

#4. Conspiracies, since they cannot be engaged in without the fellowship of others, are for that reason most perilous; for as most men are either fools or knaves, we run excessive risk in making such folk our companions.

Francesco Guicciardini

#5. It is a great matter to be in authority over others; for authority, if it be rightly used, will make you feared beyond your actual resources.

Francesco Guicciardini

#6. One who imitates what is bad always goes beyond his model; while one who imitates what is good always comes up short of it.

Francesco Guicciardini

#7. By numberless examples it will evidently appear that human affairs are as subject to change and fluctuation as the waters of the sea agitated by the winds.

Francesco Guicciardini

#8. Let no one trust so entirely to natural prudence as to persuade himself that it will suffice to guide him without help from experience.

Francesco Guicciardini

#9. Affairs that depend on many rarely succeed.

Francesco Guicciardini

#10. Ambition is not in itself an evil; nor is he to be condemned whose spirit prompts him to seek fame by worthy and honourable ways.

Francesco Guicciardini

#11. He is less likely to be mistaken who looks forward to a change in the affairs of the world than he who regards them as firm and stable.

Francesco Guicciardini

#12. There is no evil in human affairs that has not some good mingled with it.
[It., Non e male alcuno nelle cose umane che non abbia congiunto seco qualche bene.]

Francesco Guicciardini

#13. The return we reap from generous actions is not always evident.

Francesco Guicciardini

#14. Pay no heed to those who tell you that they have relinquished place and power of their own accord, and from their love of quiet. For almost always they have been brought to this retirement by their insufficiency and against their will.

Francesco Guicciardini

#15. If you attempt certain things at the right time, they are easy to accomplish - in fact, they almost get done by themselves. If you undertake them before the time is right, not only will they fail, but they will often become impossible to accomplish even when the time would have been right.

Francesco Guicciardini

#16. There is nothing so fleeting as the memory of benefits received.

Francesco Guicciardini

#17. Experience has always shown, and reason also, that affairs which depend on many seldom succeed.

Francesco Guicciardini

#18. He who imitates what is evil always goes beyond the example that is set; on the contrary, he who imitates what is good always falls short.

Francesco Guicciardini

#19. Waste no time with revolutions that do not remove the causes of your complaints but simply change the faces of those in charge.

Francesco Guicciardini

#20. To give vent now and then to his feelings, whether of pleasure or discontent, is a great ease to a man's heart.

Francesco Guicciardini

#21. To relinquish a present good through apprehension of a future evil is in most instances unwise ... from a fear which may afterwards turn out groundless, you lost the good that lay within your grasp.

Francesco Guicciardini

#22. Few revolutions succeed, and when they do, you often discover they did not gain what you hoped for, and you condemn yourself to perpetual fear, as the parties you defeated may always regain power and work for your ruin.

Francesco Guicciardini

#23. Like other men, I have sought honours and preferment, and often have obtained them beyond my wishes or hopes. Yet never have I found in them that content which I had figured beforehand in my mind. A strong reason, if we well consider it, why we should disencumber ourselves of vain desires.

Francesco Guicciardini

#24. Be more guided by hope than fear.

Francesco Guicciardini

#25. How much luckier than all the rest of mankind are the astrologers who, if they tell one truth among a hundred lies, obtain so much credit that even their lies are believed.

Francesco Guicciardini

#26. We fight to great disadvantage when we fight with those who have nothing to lose.

Francesco Guicciardini

#27. As it is our nature to be more moved by hope than fear, the example of one we see abundantly rewarded cheers and encourages us far more than the sight of many who have not been well treated disquiets us.

Francesco Guicciardini

#28. Since there is nothing so well worth having as friends, never lose a chance
to make them.

Francesco Guicciardini

#29. Ambassadors are the eye and ear of states.

Francesco Guicciardini

#30. It is our nature to be more moved by hope than fear.

Francesco Guicciardini

#31. Keep your eye fixed not so much on what they [people] ought in reason to do, as on what they are likely to do based on their disposition and habits.

Francesco Guicciardini

#32. The affairs of this world are so shifting and depend on so many accidents, that it is hard to form any judgment concerning the future; nay, we see from experience that the forecasts even of the wise almost always turn out false.

Francesco Guicciardini