NEGOTIATING WITH PRINCES
ment, it is obvious that the more the opposing party can be brought to see your designs in their own light and to accept them thus, the more surely will their co-operation for any action be fruitful alike to themselves and to you.
The Bias of Human Nature.Now, of course there are few men who will entirely divest themselves of their own sentiments in favour of those of others, or who will confess that they were wrong, especially if the matter be conducted in an acrimonious discussion in which the negotiator meets all arguments freely by contradiction. But none the less the astute diplomatist will know how to exploit human nature in such a manner as to cause even the most stiff-necked opponents gradually to relax their hold upon certain opinions; and this may be most easily attained by abandoning the approach which caused the original dispute, and taking up the matter from another aspect. Thus by flattery of his amour-propre, or by some other device which may put him in a good humour, the competitor in a negotiation may be brought to consider the matter in a new light, and to accept at the end of the negotiation that which he repudiated with violence at its commencement. And, however unreasonable the majority of mankind is, it will always be observed that men retain so much respect for reason that they will always hope to be judged by the other man as acting123
