Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Louis XI.

of France, Ferdinand the Catholic, the Papal Curia, and the Venetian Council had systematically pursued the policy laid down in the chapters of the _Prince_.

But it is no less true that Machiavelli was the first in modern times to formulate a theory of government in which the interests of the ruler are alone regarded, which assumes a separation between statecraft and morality, which recognizes force and fraud among the legitimate means of attaining high political ends, which makes success alone the test of conduct, and which presupposes the corruption, venality, and baseness of mankind at large.

It was this which aroused the animosity of Europe against Machiavelli, as soon as the Prince attained wide circulation.

Nations accustomed to the Monarchical rather than the Despotic form of government resented the systematic exposition of an art of tyranny which had long been practiced among the Italians.