persons, I say, subsist wholly upon the pleasure and fortune of those who advanced them, which being two things very valuable and uncertain, they have neither knowledge nor power to continue long in that degree; know not, because, unless he be a man of extraordinary qualities and virtue, it is not reasonable to think he can know how to command other people, who before lived always in a private condition himself; cannot, because they have no forces upon whose friendship and fidelity they can rely. Moreover, States which are suddenly conquered (as all things else in Nature whose rise and increase is so speedy) can have no root or foundation but what will be shaken and supplanted by the first gust of adversity, unless they who have been so suddenly exalted be so wise as to prepare prudently in time for the conservation of what fortune threw so luckily into their lap, and establish afterwards such fundamentals for their duration as others (which I mentioned before) have done in the like cases. About the arrival at this authority either by virtue, or good fortune, I shall instance in two examples that are fresh in our memory; one is Francis Sforza, the other Cæsar Borgia; Sforza, by just means and extraordinary virtue, made himself Duke of Milan, and enjoyed it in great peace, though gained with much trouble. Borgia, on the other side (called commonly Duke of Valentine), got several fair territories by the fortune of his father Pope Alexander, and lost them all after his death, though he used all his industry, and employed all the arts which a wise and brave prince ought to do to fix himself in the sphere where the arms and fortune of other people had placed him: for he, as I said before, who laid not his foundation in time, may yet raise his superstructure, but with great trouble to the architect and great danger to the building. If, therefore, the whole progress of the said Duke be considered, it will be found what solid foundations he had laid for his future dominion, of which progress I think it not superfluous to discourse, because I know not what better precepts to display before a new prince than the example of his actions; and though his own orders and methods did him no good, it was not so much his fault as the malignity of his fortune.
Pope Alexander the Sixth had a desire to make his son Duke Valentine great, but he saw many blocks and impediments in the way, both for the present and future. First, he could not see any way to advance him to any territory that depended not upon the Church; and to those in his gift he was sure the Duke of Milan and the Venetians would never consent; for Faenza and Riminum had already put themselves under the Venetian protection. He was likewise sensible that the forces of Italy, especially those who were capable of assisting him, were in the hands of those who ought to apprehend the greatness of the Pope, as the Ursini, Colonnesi, and their followers, and therefore could not repose any great confidence in them; besides, the laws and alliances of all the States in Italy must of necessity be disturbed before he could make himself master of any part, which was no hard matter to do, finding the Venetians, upon some private interest of their own, inviting the French to another expedition into Italy, which his Holiness was so far from opposing that he promoted it by dissolution of King Louis’s former marriage. Louis therefore passed the Alps by the assistance of the Venetians and Alexander’s consent, and was no sooner in Milan but he sent forces to assist the Pope in his enterprise against Romagna, which was immediately surrendered upon the king’s reputation. Romagna being in this manner reduced by the Duke, and the Colonnesi defeated, being ambitious not only to keep what he had got, but to advance in his conquests, two things obstructed: one was the infidelity of his own army, the other the aversion of the French; for he was jealous of the forces of the Ursini who were in his service, suspected they would fail him in his need, and either hinder his conquest or take it from him when he had done; and the same fears he had of the French. And his jealousy of the Ursini was much increased when, after the expugnation of Faenza, assaulting Bologna, he found them very cold and backward in the attack. And the King’s inclination he discovered when, having possessed himself of the Duchy of Urbin, he invaded Tuscany, and was by him required to desist. Whereupon the Duke resolved to depend no longer upon fortune and foreign assistance, and the first course he took was to weaken the party of the Ursini and Colonni in Rome, which he effected very neatly by debauching such of their adherents as were gentlemen, taking them into his own service, and giving them honourable pensions and governments and commands, according to their respective qualities; so that in a few months their passion for that faction evaporated, and they turned all for the Duke. After this he attended an opportunity of supplanting the Ursini, as he had done the family of the Colonni before, which happened very luckily, and was as luckily improved: for the Ursini, considering too late that the greatness of the Duke and the Church tended to their ruin, held a council at a place called Magione, in Perugia, which occasioned the rebellion of Urbin, the tumults in Romagna, and a thousand dangers to the Duke besides; but though he overcame them all by the assistance of the French, and recovered his reputation, yet he grew weary of his foreign allies, as having nothing further to oblige them, and betook himself to his artifice, which he managed so dexterously that the Ursini reconciled themselves to him by the mediation of Seignor Paulo, with whom for his security he comported so handsomely by presenting with money, rich stuffs, and horses, that being convinced of his integrity, he conducted them to Sinigaglia, and delivered them into the Duke’s hands. Having by this means exterminated the chief of his adversaries, and reduced their friends, the Duke had laid a fair foundation for his greatness, having gained Romagna and the Duchy of Urbin, and insinuated with the people by giving them a gust of their future felicity. And because this part is not unworthy to be known for imitation sake, I will not pass it in silence. When the Duke had possessed himself of Romagna, finding it had been governed by poor and inferior lords, who had rather robbed than corrected their subjects, and given them more occasion of discord than unity, insomuch as that province was full of robberies, riots, and all manner of insolencies; to reduce them to unanimity and subjection to monarchy, he thought it necessary to provide them a good governor, and thereupon he conferred that charge upon Remiro d’Orco, with absolute power, though he was a cruel and passionate man. Orco was not long before he had settled it in peace, with no small reputation to himself. Afterwards, the Duke, apprehending so large a power might grow odious to the people, he erected a court of judicature in the middle of the province, in which every city had its advocate, and an excellent person was appointed to preside. And because he discovered that his past severity had created him many enemies, to remove that ill opinion, and recover the affections of the people, he had a mind to show that, if any cruelty had been exercised, it proceeded not from him but from the arrogance of his minister; and for their further confirmation, he caused the said governor to be apprehended, and his head chopped off one morning in the marketplace at Cesena, with a wooden dagger on one side of him and a bloody knife on the other; the ferocity of which spectacle not only appeased but amazed the people for a while. But resuming our discourse, I say, the Duke finding himself powerful enough, and secure against present danger, being himself as strong as he desired, and his neighbours in a manner reduced to an incapacity of hurting him, being willing to go on with his conquests, there remaining nothing but a jealousy of France, and not without cause, for he knew that king had found his error at last, and would be sure to obstruct him. Hereupon he began to look abroad for new allies, and to hesitate and stagger towards France, as appeared when the French army advanced into the kingdom of Naples against the Spaniards, who had besieged Cajeta. His great design was to secure himself against the French, and he had doubtless done it if Alexander had lived. These were his provisions against the dangers that were imminent; but those that were remote were more doubtful and uncertain. The first thing he feared was lest the next Pope should be his enemy, and reassume all that Alexander had given him, to prevent which he proposed four several ways. The first was by destroying the whole line of those lords whom he had dispossessed, that his Holiness might have no occasion to restore them. The second was to cajole the nobility in Rome, and draw them over to his party, that thereby he might put an awe and restraint upon the Pope. The third was, if possible, to make the College his friends. The fourth was to make himself so strong before the death of his father as to be able to stand upon his own legs and repel the first violence that should be practised against him. Three of these four expedients he had tried before Alexander died, and was in a fair way for the fourth; all the disseized lords which came into his clutches he put to death, and left few of them remaining; he had insinuated with the nobility of Rome, and got a great party in the College of Cardinals; and as to his own corroboration, he had designed to make himself master of Tuscany, had got possession of Perugia and Piombino already, and taken Pisa into his protection. And having now farther regard of the French (who were beaten out of the kingdom of Naples by the Spaniard,
