“He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command”
Niccolo Machiavelli book The Prince
Source: The Prince
Source: The Dragon Heir
“He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command”
Niccolo Machiavelli book The Prince
Source: The Prince
“He who, when he may, forbids not sin, commands it.”
Qui non vetat peccare cum possit, iubet.
Troades (The Trojan Women), line 291 (Agamemnon)
Alternate translation: He who does not prevent a crime, when he can, encourages it. (translator unknown).
Tragedies
“He who does not punish evil commands it to be done.”
Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath
Chi non punisce il male comanda che si faccia.
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
Variant: He who does not punish evil commands it to be done.
“Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth.”
Herman Melville (1818–1891) American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet
Source: Moby-Dick or, The Whale
“For in order to command well, we should know how to submit; and he who submits with a good grace will some time become worthy of commanding.”
Nam et qui bene imperat, paruerit aliquando necesse est, et qui modeste paret, videtur qui aliquando imperet dignus esse.
Marcus Tullius Cicero book De Legibus
Book III, section 2; translation by Francis Barham
De Legibus (On the Laws)
“He did not command us to give up and to discontinue all these manners of service, for”
Maimónides book The Guide for the Perplexed
Source: Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190), Part III, Ch.32
Context: The custom which was in those days general among all men, and the general mode of worship in which the Israelites were brought up, consisted in sacrificing animals in those temples which contained certain images to bow down to those images, and to burn incense before them; religious and ascetic persons were in those days the persons that were devoted to the service in the temples erected to the stars... It was in accordance with the wisdom and plan of God, as displayed in the whole Creation, that He did not command us to give up and to discontinue all these manners of service, for to obey such a commandment it would have been contrary to the nature of man, who generally cleaves to that to which he is used... By this Divine plan it was effected that the traces of idolatry were blotted out, and the truly great principle of our faith, the existence and Unity of God, was firmly established; this result was thus obtained without deterring or confusing the minds of the people by the abolition of the service to which they were accustomed and which alone was familiar to them.
“He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living creatures.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist