Editing Niccolò Machiavelli (section)

=== "Machiavellian" ===
[[File:Cesareborgia.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|''[[Portrait of a Gentleman (Melone)|Portrait of a Gentleman]]'' ([[Cesare Borgia]]), used as an example of a successful ruler in ''The Prince'']]
Machiavelli's works are sometimes even said to have contributed to the modern negative connotations of the words ''politics'' and ''politician'',<ref>{{Harvtxt|Bireley|1990|p=241}}</ref> and it is sometimes thought that it is because of him that ''Old Nick'' became an English term for the [[Devil]].<ref>{{Harvtxt|Fischer|2000|p=94}}</ref> The adjective ''Machiavellian'' became a term describing a form of politics that is "marked by cunning, duplicity, or bad faith".<ref>{{Cite dictionary|title=Definition of MACHIAVELLIAN|dictionary=[[merriam-webster.com]]|url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Machiavellian|access-date=17 October 2018}}</ref> The word [[Machiavellianism (politics)|''Machiavellianism'']] is also a term used in political discussions, often as a byword for bare-knuckled political realism.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Rahe|first=Paul A.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZqroV-TkIhgC&q=paul%20a%20rahe&pg=PR36|title=Machiavelli's Liberal Republican Legacy|year=2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1139448338|page=xxxvi|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Meinecke |first=Friedrich |date=1957 |title=Machiavellism: The Doctrine of Raison d'État and Its Place in Modern History |page=36 |url=https://archive.org/details/machiavellismdoc00mein |publisher=Yale University Press}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | chapter-url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/realism-intl-relations/ | title=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy | chapter=Political Realism in International Relations | date=2023 | publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University }}</ref>

While Machiavellianism is notable in the works of Machiavelli, scholars generally agree that his works are complex and have equally influential themes within them. For example, J. G. A. {{Harvtxt|Pocock|1975}} saw him as a major source of the [[republicanism]] that spread throughout England and North America in the 17th and 18th centuries and Leo {{Harvtxt|Strauss|1958}}, whose view of Machiavelli is quite different in many ways, had similar remarks about Machiavelli's influence on republicanism and argued that even though Machiavelli was a teacher of evil he had a "grandeur of vision" that led him to advocate immoral actions. Whatever his intentions, which are still debated today, he has become associated with any proposal where "[[the end justifies the means]]". For example, Leo {{Harvtxt|Strauss|1987|p=297}} wrote:
{{blockquote|Machiavelli is the only political thinker whose name has come into common use for designating a kind of politics, which exists and will continue to exist independently of his influence, a politics guided exclusively by considerations of expediency, which uses all means, fair or foul, iron or poison, for achieving its ends{{snd}}its end being the aggrandizement of one's country or fatherland{{snd}}but also using the fatherland in the service of the self-aggrandizement of the politician or statesman or one's party.}}

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