Caput quintum: De beneficentia Principis.
The True Work of a Prince
A prince's true glory lies in active, resourceful beneficence that seeks the welfare of others rather than personal gain, counting any day wasted in which he has not shown kindness to someone.
Since kindness and beneficence are the proper praise of good princes, with what effrontery do they claim the title of Prince for them, whose every plan aims at nothing but advancing their own interests at the expense of everyone else? In this, then, a prince must be resourceful and vigilant: finding ways to earn the goodwill of all — for that is not achieved by giving alone. Some he will assist with generosity, others he will support with his favor, the afflicted he will free by his own authority, and for some he will provide through his wisdom. And he will be so disposed that he counts any day as wasted on which he has not helped someone by his own kindness.
Generosity Without Injustice
The prince's generosity must be guided by justice and public good, never robbing some to enrich others or rewarding favoritism over virtue.
And yet the prince's generosity is not to be spent carelessly. For there are those who harshly wrench away from good citizens what they pour out on fools, informers, and attendants of pleasure. Let the commonwealth understand that the prince's kindness is extended especially to those who serve the public interest as much as possible. Let the reward go to virtue, not to favoritism. That kind of beneficence is most to be pursued by the prince which involves no one's disadvantage, or at least is joined with no injustice. For to despoil some in order to enrich others, and to ruin these in order to elevate those, is so far from being a benefit that it is really a twofold wrong — especially if what has been taken from the worthy is transferred to the unworthy.
The Prince as He Appears to His People
When citizens hide their daughters and wealth at a prince's arrival, they reveal their deep distrust, and only sincere moral authority and accountability can restore their trust.
It is no idle fiction drawn from the made-up tales of the poets that the gods were never known to visit anyone unless those who received them derived some great benefit from their coming. But when the prince arrives, if citizens hide away anything fine in their household goods, shut away daughters of remarkable beauty, send off their young men, conceal their wealth, and in every possible way draw themselves back — don't they in fact make it abundantly clear just how low an opinion they hold of him, since they do exactly what they'd do if an enemy or a plunderer were coming? When they fear at the prince's arrival the very things it was his duty to guard against — if perchance someone were plotting ambush or violence? Some fear plots from others, and violence from him as well — when one citizen complains he's been beaten, another that his virgin daughter has been abducted, another that his wife has been violated, another that he's been denied his meager pay — good heavens, how far this kind of arrival is from that image of the gods! Since the more flourishing each city is, the more suspiciously it regards the prince; at the prince's arrival the more criminal elements flee into exile, and the best and most prudent citizen takes care and withdraws — so that even if they say nothing, they certainly proclaim by their actions what opinion they hold of the prince. But let someone object: 'I can't restrain the hands of all my people; for my part, I offer what is in my power.' Make your people understand that you want this with all your heart and soul — may I perish if they won't restrain themselves! And only then will you give the people grounds to trust you — that these things happen against your will, if you don't allow them to happen with impunity.
A Christian Prince for All People
Unlike a pagan prince who might be merely just toward outsiders, a Christian prince must recognize no one as a foreigner and do good to all, honoring citizens above all while extending kindness universally.
Perhaps it was enough for a pagan prince to be generous toward his own people and merely just toward outsiders. But it belongs to a Christian prince to count no one as a foreigner, unless that person is estranged from the Sacraments of Christ — and not even then to provoke such people with injuries: to recognize his own citizens above all, but to do good to all those he can.1
The Sacred Duty to Strangers
Following Plato, a prince must take even greater care to protect guests and strangers than citizens, since they are more vulnerable and were thought to be under Jupiter's special protection.
Although a ruler must constantly work to make sure no one suffers any injustice, still, following Plato's judgment, you need to take even greater care that guests aren't harmed in any way than that citizens aren't — because guests, cut off from the help of friends and relatives, are more exposed to injury. For this reason they were also thought to have Jupiter as their avenger, and from that circumstance they gave him the name Xenios.2
Read the original Latin
Cum propria bonorum Principum laus sit benignitas ac beneficentia, qua tandem fronte Principis uocabulum sibi uindicant, quibus omnium consiliorum summa huc tendit, ut cunctorum incommodo suis consulant rationibus? In hoc igitur erit ingeniosus ac uigilans Princeps, quo pacto possit de omnibus bene mereri, quae res non est tantum in dando sita. Alios iuuabit liberalitate, alios fauore subleuabit, alios afflictos auctoritate sua liberabit, nonnullis ingenio consulet. Et hoc animo erit, ut eum diem sibi perisse putet, quo non beneficio suo iuuerit aliquem.
Nec tamen temere collocanda est Principis liberalitas. Sunt enim qui inclementer extorqueant a bonis ciuibus, quod in moriones, delatores, et uoluptatum ministros effundant. Intelligat Respublica iis potissimum expositam Principis benignitatem, qui publicis commodis quam maxime consulant. Virtuti praemium sit, non affectui. Illud beneficentiae genus maxime sectandum est Principi, quod cum nullius incommodo aut certe iniuria coniunctum est. Nam alios spoliare, ut dites alios, hos pessumdare ut illos euehas, adeo non est beneficium, ut geminum potius sit maleficium, praesertim, si quod dignis ademtum est, ad indignos transferatur.
Non abs re fictis Poetarum fabulis proditum est, Deos nusquam accedere solitos, nisi magno quopiam bono eorum a quibus excipiebantur. At cum adueniante Principe, ciues si quid est elegantius in supellectile abdunt, filias insigni forma recludunt, adolescentes ablegant, opes dissimulant, ac modis omnibus contrahunt sese, nonne re ipsa satis indicant, quam de eo habeant opinionem, cum id faciunt, quod facerent adueniente hoste aut praedone? Cum ad Principis aduentum iis timent quae illius officii fuerat tueri, si quis forte insidias aut uim pararet? Ab aliis timent insidias, ab illo uim quoque, cum alius queritur se pulsatum, alius abductam uirginem, alius stupratam uxorem, alius negatam mercedulam, papae, quantum hic aduentus abest ab illa Deorum imagine: cum ciuitatum, ut est quaeque florentissima, ita maxime suspectum habet Principem cum ad Principis aduentum sceleratiores exsiliunt, optimus quisque et cordatissimus cauet et contrahitur: ut nihil loquantur, certe factis praedicant quam habeant de Principe opinionem. At respondeat aliquis, Non possum meorum omnium continere manus, ego quod in me est, praesto. Fac intelligant tui, id te uehementer et ex animo uelle, dispeream ni continebunt. Et ita demum populo fidem facies, haec inuito te fieri, si non patieris impune fieri. Fortassis Ethnico Principi satis erat in suos esse benignum, in exteros iustum modo.
At Christiani Principis est, nullum pro extero ducere, nisi qui sit alienus a Christi Sacramentis, ac ne hos quidem iniuriis lacessere: suos quidem ciues in primis agnoscere, caeterum de omnibus bene mereri de quibus possit.
Quamquam illud perpetuo studendum est Principi, ne cuiquam omnino fiat iniuria, tamen iuxta Platonis sententiam, diligentius est cauendum, ne quid laedantur hospites, quam ne ciues, propterea quod hospites amicorum et cognatorum auxilio destituti, magis obnoxii sunt iniuriis, unde et Iouem ultorem habere putabantur, cui ex re Xenio fecere nomen.
Notes
- 1 ↩The Latin plays on the contrast between extero (foreigner/outsider) and suos ciues (his own citizens), with the Sacraments of Christ marking the only legitimate boundary of exclusion. Ducere here carries the sense of 'consider, reckon' rather than literal leading.
- 2 ↩Xenio: proper name / epithet of Jupiter derived from the Greek ξένιος (pertaining to hospitality and guests). The Latin phrase 'cui ex re Xenio fecere nomen' means 'from which circumstance they made the name Xenios for him.'
The Education of a Christian Prince (Institutio principis Christiani) companion
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