26, 1513) and to Piero Soderini (no date) should be studied side by side with the _Principe_ for the light they throw on Machiavelli's opinions there expressed.
These circumstances make the morality of the book the more remarkable.
To teach political science denuded of commonplace hypocrisies was a worthy object.

But while seeking to lay bare the springs of action, and to separate statecraft from morals, Machiavelli found himself impelled to recognize a system of inverted ethics.

The abrupt division of the two realms, ethical and political, which he attempted, was monstrous; and he ended by substituting inhumanity for human nature.

Unable to escape the logic which links morality of some sort with conduct, he gave his adhesion to the false code of contemporary practice.

He believed that the right way to attain a result so splendid as the liberation of Italy was to proceed by force, craft, bad faith, and all the petty arts of a political adventurer.