LECTURE 6: MACHIAVELLI AND THE BIRTH OF THE MODERN
BEING GOOD AND BEING SUCCESSFUL:
IS IT EITHER, OR?
Machiavelli. The origin of modern philosophy, at the
opening of the
Western ascendence. In the whole history of thought, no
thinker as
influential as M has been so despised. Most of his influence has
been
in the field of politics but he's also the source of much of
the
modern mind in ethics. All his successors repudiate his teaching-
it
was much too radical to be popular in its original form. In his time
he
was called the son of the devil. And one of the most popular names
for the
devil was 'old nick', as Niccolo was his name. So, not only
was he named
after the devil, the devil was named after him! Wow!
Yet though all his
successors reject his teaching, they all accept
some of it and mitigate it
with their own thought. So do you. Quiz: is
politics about a) virtue b) doing
what is possible? B. That is
Machiavelli. The classical and medieval
philosophers said A.
Machiavelli lowered the ideals. The world accepts his
lowering of the
ideals, but the world Machiavellian is not a word of praise.
Someone
who teaches you to be sinister, sly, scheming, amoral or
immoral,
purely pragmatic. Someone who teaches you to be successful rather
than
moral, powerful rather than good. And that's not an
unfair
description! He says it himself.
In the Prince, all he says
logically follow from three assumptions.
First from metaphysics, another from
anthropology and one from
epistimology. Metaphysical assumption (about
reality) is that "Reality
does NOT include ideals or goods or values, values
are not facts, not
objectively real. Reality consists only of material facts
(facts you
can see and get) M is a materialist. Anthropology (about man); man
is
essentially competitive, immoral, wicked and selfish. He must
be
because he just said that matter is all that is 'real' so if
thats
true, than all that is real in man is matter, too. His biology.
And
biology is competitive. Basic law of all matter: two bodies
cannot
occupy the same space at the same time. The more money I give to
you,
the less I have. The more food I eat, the less there is for you
to
eat. Only spirit transcends this. If spiritual things are indeed
real,
they can be given away without being lost. Teachers give
knowledge
without losing it. Lovers do not lose joy or self when they give
that
self to another. Material goods like power, glory, territory
and
wealth are diminished when shared. But spiritual goods like
love,
beauty and wisdom and joy MULTIPLY when shared. But if they
don't
exist, and if all that exists is the material, then men will
compete
always, like two animals. BUT M says, traditional morality is
always
teaching that selfishness is BAD and unselfishness is GOOD.
Therefore,
morality totally contradicts morality. The third, the
epistimological
truism is that human history can be a science, and we can
know it.
There is a formula for success in public life. There are only
two
variables in life: Virtu and Fortuna. Virtu is not virtue,
but
strength. Power, control, prowess. Your ability to impose your will
on
something else. Fortuna is not fortune, meanwhile, it is rather
luck,
fate. All the things that you cannot control. So, the formula
for
success? Maximize Virtu and minimize Fortuna. Or, the conquest
by
virtu over fortuna.
M's assumption about reality, that material
goods is all that there
are and ideals are not real, is metaphysical. The
assumption about
anthropological man, that man is by nature selfish and
competitive, is
about man. The third assumption is the epistimological one,
that human
history can be reduced to a science, and we can know it and
predict
and control human behavior scientifically... is also a spiritual
one:
because reducing everything to virtu and fortuna is implicitly
the
politics of atheism. And he in fact was an athieist (he never came
out
with that- he would've been burned at the stake in 16th C
Italy)...
What about the things that flow from divine providence? Nothing
about
that here! Only Virtu (the human agent) and Fortuna (pure
chance).
In the Prince, Machiavelli radically separated the real and the
ideal.
The classical ideals were too high and difficult to attain. They
are
like the stars, says M. Beautiful but impractical... too high and
far
away, to cast light on our lowly Earthly paths... when walking on
a
mountain road at night, we use a lantern to see by on our path, not
the
stars. The lantern is the realistic answer to 'how do I negociate
the road at
night?'
Forget ideals! Plato began with ideal states, and for the last
2000
years (Plato--Machiavelli) no one ever created the ideal state!
So
what to do? It dialectic: either make what is real the ideal, or
lower
the ideal back to the real. Since the first is troublesome, lets
do
the second! Thus, the immoralism of the Prince is defended. This is
not
a book about ideals, but a book about success. If you want to find
a book
about contemplating beautiful and unattainable ideals, like the
stars, then
go ahead and read Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas,
Cicero. But if you
want success, read my Prince. Its not a book about
ethics, in fact, it
examines what happens to Good people in history-
they become martyrs. The low
road, my friend, is the road to success!
Its not a value, its a fact. Unarmed
prophets have failed, armed
prophets have succeeded.
So, real and
ideal are NOT the same. Plus, only a few individuals in
any state can be
saints, no society can as a whole. Remember when
Plato said that a soul and a
state are kind of the same thing, can
what is good for an individual soul can
be said to be good for the
state too? He said that Justice is more profitable
for a soul and a
state than injustice. Well M says, after two thousand
years... no way.
Justice does NOT mean the same thing for a person and a
state. The
state must be utterly value-free. A third implication of
Machiavelli's
separation of the real and the ideal: before Machiavelli, it
was
assumed that the ideal was the standard for the real. How closely
the
real came to the ideal is how well it is judged. M flipped it:
ideals
are to be judged on how realistic they are, and how practical
they
are, and how they have worked in the past. We can know this
as
historians and as scientists. Ethics: theory. History: data. Use
the
data.
Machiavelli explains that he is expanding on Plato (he is
really
contradicting him), in the Prince, ch. 15: The things for
which
princes have been praised and blamed have been written about
before.
But this is an original path to doing this, because this is
for
practical use. Many have dreamed up republics and principalities
that
have never existed. And the gulf between how one should live and
one
does live is so big, that a man who neglects what is actually done,
in
favor of what should be done, is doomed to self destruction, not
self
preservation. Sounds Darwinian.
Well... in Republic, Plato said
that the philosopher-king (the Prince)
must know both the shadows in the cave
(the follys and illusions of
popular politics) AND the more real world
outside the cave, justice,
truth etc. So, its M's propaganda that the
classical authors were
narrow and naive and one-sided and that M is opening a
wider
perspective. Its the other way around.
In addition, Plato would
agree that 'a man who neglects what is
actually done for what should be done,
learns the way to self
desruction..." but Plato's goal was not self
preservation. Socrates
could've saved his body at the trial by lying a
little, but he thought
that a man was his soul. He sacrificed his body and
saved his soul. M
thinks that is absolutely crazy.
In ranking bodily
self-preservation above virtue, M concludes that the
body is more than the
soul. He does not SAY this, like Plato says the
opposite. Instead, he says,
"If a Prince wants to act virtuously, he
will come against those who are not.
If he wants to know how to stay
powerful and maintain his rule, he must
therefore not be virtuous."
Where Plato attempted to teach virtue, and
Machiavelli is now teaching
vice! In the Meno, Socrates wanted to see if
virtue could be taught.
Mow M says men must be taught to be vicious. There is
a paradox here.
Usually, people say that "Plato was an optimist, he taught
virtue, and
Machiavelli was a pessimist, he taught vice." But this is
not
necessarily true: Socrates want to teach virtue because he knew
that
men needed that training! You teach virtue to sinners, not
saints.
They were not born virtuous and pure. This seems more pessimistic
than
M! Indeed, M thought men were generally too good, too good to
survive
in the wicked world of politics. And therefore needed to be
taught
some vice. Here's, an example of M's wicked world: The
Pizzi
conspiracy: on Easter Sunday, in the sanctuary at the moment of
the
consecration, there was to be a murder. It was botched, but
blood
flowed, and the congregation captured the two conspirators of
this
offensive- one of whom was the bishop- and they hung them out
the
cathedral windows, and the crowd below cheered as the two men tried
to
stab each other while dangling. Edifying. Well, Machiavelli knew
that
in this world, you gotta do what you gotta do.
One notorious
answer to the wickedness of human events for a Prince,
comes in ch. 18, when
M asks "when should a prince honor his
word?"Answer: Only when it works. He
contrast the traditional value
first: everyone knows that a Prince should
honor his word and that
this is praiseworthy. Nevertheless, experience shows
that the prince
who has achieved great things has given their word lightly.
he knows
how to trick people with cunning. A prudent ruler, then, should
not
keep his word if it does not befit him. Wow, a new ethic here.
Should.
So, a prince should not be honest or he will not survive.
The
assumption is that survival is the greatest good. Plato would
not
agree with either of these.
Another argument for the idea that
Princes should not honor their
world: "if all men were good than this could
be set aside, but since
they are not, and wretched creatures, and would not
keep their word to
you, you need not keep it to them." This assumes that your
morality
depends on other peoples' morality. That, how good or evil
other
people are is your standard too!
Usually, machiavelli is said to
be advising his Princes to be
proactive, strong leaders, not reactive. But
its really the opposite!
He's telling them to wimp out and let others set the
standard, like
Pilate not Jesus, to stay in power. This arguement is from
history, it
works! He says. Well, which of those two, Pilate the
Machiavellian
Prince, or Jesus, the moralist, which has survived? Which had
more
Virtu, more influence on history, than any other man who ever
lived?
And which is reviled and condemned a million times a day
when
Christians say their creed: "suffered under Pontius Pilate, died
and
was buried". And, which one attained success? Which was happy?
Which
accomplished his job? Jesus of course, but M would say "yes but
Jesus
was killed. Remember, armed prophets succeed, unarmed prophets
fail".
But to understand M, lets look at another example from Florence.
A
friar, Savanna Roll was beloved and like St. Francis, preached
reform
and people reformed their lives. People loved him, but then
people
wanted to go back to their wicked ways, and M literally watched as
an
unarmed prophet failed, and was burned at the stake. The
Florentines
burned their external conscience.
So M is disagreeing with
an assumption that EVERYONE before him
believed about human nature. They
believed that there was a strong
moral force in human nature, something like
conscience. Dei 'spiritual
power,' in Chinese. A Buddhist story: humble
little monk was the
wisest in the land. a warrior was also strong and
arrogant. The
warrior said, "I think you are a fake: show me your wisdom or i
will
show you my sword. What can you tell me that I do not know?" the
monk
said, "I will show you the gates of heaven and hell, for you do
are
foolish and do not know them." The warrior was enraged, got red in
the
face and went to cut off his head. Pointing to the warriors face,
the
monk said, "I have now shown you the gates of hell." The
warrior
paused for a moment, and was ashamed, and put back his sword. The
monk
said, "And now i have shown you the gates of heaven." That is
an
example of Dei, and M argues that it doesn't exist! He writes "it
is
unreasonable to expect an armed man would obey an unarmed man."
He
calls this story fiction, and it couldn't really happen. What we
DO
observe, proves the opposite is true. In fact, if man were moral,
he
would fear pangs of consciousness more than fear physical pain.
But
you must define fear. Do you fear your son become the victim of a
crime, or
that he become a criminal himself? Is it worse for you to be
attacked by a
demon than to become a demon? No. It is somehow worse to
accept evil into
your freewill than to be the victim of it. We deep
down agree with Plato in
the Republic when he said Justice is always
more profitable than injustice.
And what he said in Gorgias, "Doing
injustice harms us more than suffering
it." And of course Jesus' 'What
good is it to win the world... and lose your
own soul?' And its true:
what good would it do you to win all the objects,
but lose the person
who wanted to enjoy those objects!
All this is
negated by M. He purports denial of Dei and conscience,
inner-sanction, and
this leads him to says something disturbing about
war: "There is no avoiding
war, it can only be postponed to the
advantage of others. Laws are worthless
without punishments for
enforcing them... and since no one is virtuous, there
is no dei, and
there is not an inner force, so the "out-there cops" must
multiply. M
spends a LOT of time therefore on war. No laws, just war. "The
art of
war is all that is expected of a ruler. A Prince must think about
one
thing continually, military strategy. Well we think this is
absurd.
But, for M it was not. It logically followed from his
anthropology,
that no one was trustworthy. You can't trust your staff. Trust
NOBODY.
He advised a Prince who conquers a new territory to go live
there
himself and not let subordinates get in charge cause it will be
stolen
or spoiled. This never fails: Whoever is responsible for
someone
else's successes, does his own undoing. Trust no one. Cooperation
is
impossible, competition is the law of nature. Problem is
that
cooperation is more efficient. G. Carlin said that "In america, in
3
generations, everyone will be a lawyer and the US a huge
courtroom.
Without food." Bronx Tale, "It is far better to be feared, than
loved,
if you cannot be both." Pure Machiavelli. This is a notorious
logical
extension of M, and he added, "For, men are fickle and
deceitful.
Treat them well and they are with you. But what is better, love
or
fear? They worry less about doing injury to one who makes
himself
loved, than one that makes himself feared. Men break the bond of
love
as they please... they are in charge. They do not break the bond
of
fear, as they are in fear of punishment, the Prince is in charge." M
is
useful. He connects the ethical conclusions of a philosopher's
metaphysics
and anthropology. In this case, using Virtu as your means
to
success.
Neitzsche said, "To understand any philosphers
metaphysics
(life-view), just look to their arguments and the morality they
lead
too." Plato vs. Machiavelli: Plato says "wisdom consists
of
differentiating appearance and reality, and choosing reality. To
know
it, and improve it. Not the cave, not the nexus. Reality." M
flips
this, and says that appearance is more important! Huh? Everyone
sees
who you appear to be, only a few know the real you. Well, this is
just
spineless, he is using other peoples' opinion. This is
today's
advertising! They say, "image is everything" what you appear to be
is
more important than the reality. Fortuna is image. Hitler
was
machiavellian cause he was the first to master the media.
Totally
practical. In addition, M says that cleverness in military
force
helps: foresight. The south almost beat the north due to the
great
strategy of Robert E. Lee. "The Romans did what all wise rulers
must:
they cope with present troubles, and also deal with ones that
may
arise, and forestall them. If trouble is sensed well in advance,
it
can easily be remedied, but if you wait for it to show itself,
any
medicine may be too late, it may be incurable. Doctors say that
in
the beginning, it is easy to cure but hard to diagnose. In time,
it
becomes easy to diagnose but hard to cure. So it is in
politics.
Lao Tzu said the same thing in the Tau Te Ching. He spoke of a
chinese
emperor who ruled by music: he walked in disguise through all
the
cities of the realm. and listened to the music people made. if it
was
good, he left the city alone. if not, soldiers came in.
Musical
revolutions in modern times always precede political
revolution!
So, can the Machiavellian formula, and that's what it is, a
formula,
work? He's banking that it does, because its practical and not
moral.
The whole point is that it works, not that its good. So if it
don't
work, its shot. It would be a big win for the moralists who see
1st
and 2nd things, morality is 1st, worldly success is 2nd. If you
put
2nd things first, you negate both. So does the immoral advice
work?
Since fortune is changeable, one who adapts his policy to the
time
prospers, and those who clash with the times do not. Since policy
is
virtu and the times come under fortuna, this means that the only
way
that virtu can conquer fortuna is by conforming to it. Its the
old
master slave relationship in which the master in enslaved to
the
slave. In order to master fortune, you have to be fortune's
wimp,
lackey. You bend, you break, you lose your soul to the
environment.
The concrete Prince is really a wimp.
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