Pareto's general sociology : a physiologist's interpretation / by Lawrence J. Henderson.

  • Henderson, Lawrence J. (Lawrence Joseph), 1878-1942.
Date:
1935
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Pareto's general sociology : a physiologist's interpretation / by Lawrence J. Henderson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    18/140 (page 4)
    aspects. In Chapter XVIII of The Prince, Machia- velli says, “Everyone admits how praiseworthy it is in a prince to keep faith, and to live with in¬ tegrity and not with craft. Nevertheless, our ex¬ perience has been that those princes who have done great things have held good faith of little account, and have known how to circumvent the intellect of men by craft, and in the end have overcome those who have relied on their word.” On this text the following remarks and queries may be set down at random: (1) In reading this and similar passages most people feel disgust or horror, much as they do in reading descriptions of certain diseases, and fail to notice objectively the character of what they have read. (2) They often transfer their dislike from the book to the author. (3) Thus both book and author have acquired a bad name and it has become difficult for anyone to approach the book dispassionately. (4) Machiavelli’s statement is an induction from experience. (5) Is this induction well founded.^ Is it con¬ firmed by later experience with later forms of society.^ One thinks of such instances as the careers of Henri IV of France, of Elizabeth of England, of Frederic II of Prussia who wrote the Anti-Mach- iavel, of Napoleon, and, as political conditions