live a length of time peaceably in their own country, without any of their fellow citizens having: conspired against them, while other new princes, by reason of their cruelties, have not been able, even, in time of peace, to secure themselves in their usurpations, much less in time of war. I am of opinion it greatly depends on the good or bad use they make of their cruelty. It may be said to be well employed (if we may call good that which is evil) when it is only once exercised; when it is dictated by the absolute necesșity of securing their power, and that they never afterwards have recourse to it, but for the public welfare: they who employ it ill, are those who are sparing of it in the commencement, but instead of diminishing increase it. Those who employ it only at first, as Agathocles did, may hope for pardon from God and mankind. Those who use it otherwise cannot maintain their sovereignty.
It is therefore necessary that the usurper of a state should once only commit all the cruelties which his safety renders necessary, that he may never have cause to repeat them: it is by not renewing them, that he acquires the loyalty of his new subjects, and by favours he rivets their attachment. If from bad counsel or timidity he acts otherwise, he will find it necessary to have a poniard always in his hand; it will then become impossible for him to rely on his subjects, whose confidence
