Discourses on Livy · Chapter
XLVI explained
Machiavelli discusses how ambition escalates in republics: citizens initially seek to avoid injury, but as they gain power and friends through seemingly honorable means, they eventually become a threat to liberty.
What happens
Machiavelli discusses how ambition escalates in republics: citizens initially seek to avoid injury, but as they gain power and friends through seemingly honorable means, they eventually become a threat to liberty. He cites Livius on the cycle of factional arrogance and oppression, and warns that once a citizen becomes too powerful to oppose, the republic faces either immediate ruin or eventual slavery.
Themes in this chapter
Ambition and Power
Machiavelli analyzes how citizens climb from one step of ambition to another, starting with self-defense and ending in oppression, leading to the overthrow of commonwealths.
Necessity and Reason of State
The chapter discusses the necessity of curbing ambition through institutional ordinances to prevent a citizen from acquiring power that endangers freedom.
Characters to notice
- Titus Livius
Cited for his judicious account of the tumults in Rome after the commons regained freedom, and for the observation that when one faction is humble the other grows haughty.
- Caesar
Quoted via Sallust: 'all ill actions have their origin in fair beginnings,' used to illustrate how ambition starts with seemingly honorable acts.
Key passages
“whenever either the commons or the nobles were humble, the others grew haughty; so that if the commons kept within due bounds, the young nobles began to inflict injuries upon them, against which the tribunes, who were themselves made the objects of outrage, were little able to give redress; while the nobles on their part, although they could not close their eyes to the ill behaviour of their young men, were yet well pleased that if excesses were to be committed, they should be committed by their own faction, and not by the commons.”
When one faction is subdued, the other becomes arrogant; if the commons behave moderately, the young nobles attack them, and the tribunes cannot protect them; the nobles tolerate their own youths' excesses because they prefer that their own side commit the wrongs.
Livius's observation on the reciprocal arrogance and oppression between Roman factions.
“all ill actions have their origin in fair beginnings.”
Every evil deed starts from something that appears good.
Sallust's maxim, quoted by Caesar, used to explain how ambition initially seems praiseworthy.