"The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him."
"There is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a new order of things..... Whenever his enemies have occasion to attack the innovator they do so with the passion of partisans, while the others defend him sluggishly so that the innovator and his party alike are vulnerable."
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Source: Discourses on Livy. Book by Niccolo Machiavelli, Book 1, Ch. 37, (as translated by LJ Walker and B Crick, 1517.
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