The works of the famous Nicholas Machiavel, citizen and secretary of Florence written originally in Italian, and from thence newly and faithfully translated into English.

CHAP. XLIII.

Those who are born in the same Country, retain almost the same Nature thorow all the variety of times.

WIsemen were wont to say (and perhaps not unworthily) That he who would know what will be, must consider what has been already, because there is nothing in the world now, nor will be hereafter, but what has▪ and will have conformity with the productions of former times; and the reason is, because proceeding from men who have, and have had always the same passions, they must necessarily have the same effects. 'Tis true indeed their actions are sometimes better and more virtuous in this Province, than in that, and in that more than in another, according to the difference of their Education, for from the manner of their breeding, people take the first rudiments of their conver∣sation; and it makes it more easie to conjecture future events, by what is passed, when we see some Nations retaining their humours and peculiarities a long time. So one Nation has been always covetous, another fraudulent; and so on the other side, one has been con∣stantly famous for one virtue, and another for another. He who peruses the passages of old in our very City of Florence, and compares them with our modern, will find that it has been all along exposed to the avarice, pride, cruelty, and falshood of the Germans and

French: Every one knows how unfaithfully we have been dealt withal: How often Charles VIII. of France received our Money, and promised to restore the Citadels at Pisa; but never perform'd, which was a great instance of his infidelity, and avarice. But to wave such recent examples, every one knows what hapned in the War betwixt the Floren∣tines, and the Visconti Dukes of Milan. The Florentines being destitute of other expe∣dients, resolved to bring the Emperor into Italy, to fall upon Lombardy with all his power and reputation. The Emperor engaged to bring a great Army into Italy; to make War upon the Visconti, and to defend Florence against them, upon condition the Florentines pay'd him 100000 Ducats by way of advance, and as much more when they came into Italy. The Florentines agreed, paid their first Money down, and the rest when they enter'd Italy; yet when he had marched as far as Verona, he turned back without doing any thing, complaining of the Florentines for want of performance: So that had not Florence been under some extraordinary necessity, or passion, or had they ever read and considered the ancient customs of those Nations, they would never have been so often over-reached, see∣ing they have been always alike, and used the same practices in all places, with all people. Thus they served the Tuscans of old, who having been many times over-power'd and routed, and dispersed by the Romans, and finding their own force unable to defend them; they articled with the French on this side of the Alps to give them a Sum of Money, for which the French were to joyn their forces with the Tuscaps, and march with them against the Romans: But when the French had got their Money, they refused to perform the con∣ditions on their part, alledging that they received it not to make War upon the Romans, but to forbear infesting them themselves: by which infidelity and avarice in the French, the poor Tuscans were at once defeated both of their Money and assistance. From whence we may conclude that the Tuscans were formerly of the same nature as now, and especially the Florentines, and the French and other foreign Nations had always the same inclination to deceive them.