29
produce healthy states, otherwise, they will produce sickly ones. There is no
other choice.
Reflections.
If the foregoing account is accurate, which I believe it is, it is safe to say
that Machiavelli’s natural philosophy underlies his political philosophy taken as a
whole. From a comparative perspective, it does so in the way natural philosophy
underlies Hobbes’ political philosophy. There is one critical difference, however,
between the two natural philosophies: the one is pre-modern while the other is
modern.
From the scientific point of view, the supreme end of Machiavelli’s politics
is the acquisition of riches and glory, wealth and power, through the agency of
healthy states. Whether the states are republican or monarchical is secondary to
whether they actually succeed in what they set out to acquire.
His natural philosophy also helps us to understand the nature of the
obstacles standing in the way of achieving riches and glory. The obstacles are
the cyclic theory of history, the role of Fortune, the temperament, the quality of
the times, and the foreknowledge that glory is one day going to vanish. At the
same time, natural philosophy also lays down the moral conditions under which
states are successful, viz., the availability of virtu (princely or civic). But
Machiavellian virtu calls for the rejection of classical conception of virtue, and the
Christian conceptions of religion and history. The amoralism that results from
Convention