Machiavelli maintains that the prince must always be concerned with war. For it is only through his armies that a prince will be able to maintain and control power. Without power and the ability to maintain it, a prince is doomed in the run across of Machiavelli. As he writes, "A prince, then, should have no opposite thought or object so very much at heart, and make no other thing so much his special study as the art of war and the system of rules and discipline of his army" (Machiavelli 1965, 73). A prince who fails to do so risks danger and will not be prince for long in Machiavelli'
The courtier must by his very character have not only wit, but similarly "a comely shape of person and countenance, but also a certaine grace, and as they say, a hue that sh alone make him at the rootage sight acceptable and loving unto who so beholdeth him" (Castiglione 1953, 271).
Although men of small degree may have many of these attributes, it is far much likely that they will appear in the character of a man who has been nobly bred and who has been brought up from birth through childhood into adulthood to display courage and wisdom at all times. This paragon of virtue is described by Castiglione (1953) as rising from the nature of the noble man and as something to be desired and perhaps even envied. Courtiers must abstain from doing ill and must at all times make sure that they allow for their prince with good advice and with just and fair support of his actions. The more nice these qualities are in the courtier, "the more shall he be worthie praise; albeit I judge not necessarie in him so utter(a) a knowledge of things and other qualities that is requisite in a Captaine" (Castiglione 1953, 274). Here, Castiglione is distinguishing between the man of affairs and the man of the military. However, he does advance that "I judge the principall and true profession of a Courtier ought to bee in feets of armes, the which above all I will have him use lively and to bee knowne among other of his hardiness, for his achieving of enterprises, and for his fidelitie towarde him whom he serveth" (Castiglione 1953, 274).
The subject of what constitutes an ideal prince is also addressed by Castiglione
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