PhilosophyQuotes:

"It is not unknown to me how many men have had, and still have, the opinion that the affairs of the world are in such wise governed by fortune and by God that men with their wisdom cannot direct them and that no one can even help them..."

"...he will be successful who directs his actions according to the spirit of the times, and that he whose actions do not accord with the times will not be successful."

"There never was a new prince who has disarmed his subjects; rather when he has found them disarmed he has always armed them, because, by arming them, those arms become yours..."

-Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527), The Prince

Machiavelli's The Prince is available online at Amazon.com.