The slavery of Israel in Egypt, the oppression of the Persians by the Medes, the dispersion of the Athenians into villages, were the occasions which enabled Moses and Cyrus and Theseus to display their greatness.

The new Prince, who would fain win honor in Italy and confer upon his country untold benefits, finds her at the present moment 'more enslaved than the Hebrews, more downtrodden than the Persians, more disunited than the Athenians, without a chief, without order, beaten, despoiled, mangled, overrun, subject to every sort of desolation.' Fortune could not have offered him a nobler opportunity.
'See how she prays God to send her some one who should save her from these barbarous cruelties ind insults! See her all ready and alert to follow any standard, if only there be a man to raise it!' Then Machiavelli addresses himself to the chief of the Medici in person.

'Nor is there at the present moment any place more full of hope for her than your illustrious House, which by its valor and its fortune, favored by God and by the Church, whereof it is now the head, might take the lead in this delivery.' This is followed by one of the rare passages of courtly rhetoric which, when Machiavelli condescends to indulge in them, add peculiar splendor to his style.

Then he turns again to speak of the means which should immediately be used.

He urges Lorenzo above all things to put no faith in mercenaries or auxiliaries, but to raise his own forces, and to rely on the Italian infantry.