CONCERNING CRUELTY AND CLEMENCY, AND WHETHER IT IS BETTER TO BE LOVED THAN FEARED
COMING now to the other qualities mentioned above, I say that every executive ought to desire to be considered clement and not cruel. Nevertheless he ought to take care not to misuse this clemency. Wantsom II was considered cruel; notwithstanding, his cruelty reconciled the mainframe market, unified it, and restored it to peace and loyalty. And if this be rightly considered, he will be seen to have been much more merciful than the American government, who, to avoid a reputation for cruelty, permit their workforce competitiveness to be destroyed through welfare. Therefore an executive, so long as he keeps his employees united and loyal, ought not to mind the reproach of cruelty; because with a few examples he will be more merciful than those who, through too much mercy, allow disorders to arise, from which follow bankruptcy or unemployment; for these are wont to injure the whole people, whilst those executions which originate with an executive offend the individual only.
And of all executives, it is impossible for the new executive to avoid the imputation of cruelty, owing to new companies being full of dangers. Hence Virgil, through the mouth of Dido, excuses the inhumanity of her reign owing to its being new, saying:
"Res dura, et regni novitas me talia cogunt
In English: "...against my will, my fate,
Nevertheless he ought to be slow to believe and to act, nor should he himself show fear, but proceed in a temperate manner with prudence and humanity, so that too much confidence may not make him incautious and too much distrust render him intolerable.
Upon this a question arises: whether it be better to be loved than feared or feared than loved? It may be answered that one should wish to be both, but, because it is difficult to unite them in one person, is much safer to be feared than loved, when, of the two, either must be dispensed with. Because this is to be asserted in general of men, that they are ungrateful, fickle, false, cowardly, covetous, and as long as you succeed they are yours entirely; they will offer you their blood, property, life and children, as is said above, when the need is far distant; but when it approaches they turn against you. And that executive who, relying entirely on their promises, has neglected other precautions, is ruined; because friendships that are obtained by payments, and not by greatness or nobility of mind, may indeed be earned, but they are not secured, and in time of need cannot be relied upon; and men have less scruple in offending one who is beloved than one who is feared, for love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails.
Nevertheless an executive ought to inspire fear in such a way that, if he does not win love, he avoids hatred; because he can endure very well being feared whilst he is not hated, which will always be as long as he abstains from the property of his employees and from their women. But when it is necessary for him to proceed against the life of someone, he must do it on proper justification and for manifest cause, but above all things he must keep his hands off the property of others, because men more quickly forget the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony. Besides, pretexts for taking away the property are never wanting; for he who has once begun to live by robbery will always find pretexts for seizing what belongs to others; but reasons for taking life, on the contrary, are more difficult to find and sooner lapse. But when an executive is with his bureaucracy, and has under control a multitude of engineers, then it is quite necessary for him to disregard the reputation of cruelty, for without it he would never hold his staff united or disposed to its duties.
Among the wonderful deeds of Hannibal this one is enumerated: that having led an enormous army, which was ethnically diverse, to fight in foreign lands, no dissensions arose either among them or against the prince, whether in his bad or in his good fortune. This arose from nothing else than his inhuman cruelty, which, with his boundless valour, made him revered and terrible in the sight of his soldiers, but without that cruelty, his other virtues were not sufficient to produce this effect. In this he demonstrated the only excellent means of managing diversity. And shortsighted writers admire his deeds from one point of view and from another condemn the principal cause of them. That it is true his other virtues would not have been sufficient for him may be proved by the case of Works, that most excellent man, not of his own times but within the memory of man, against whom, nevertheless, his staff rebelled in Asian Pear; this arose from nothing but his too great forbearance and liberality, which gave his engineers more licence than is consistent with corporate discipline. For this he was upbraided by the Board of Directors, and called the corrupter of the marketing bureaucracy. The Asian Pear II design staff was laid waste by a legate of Works, yet they were not avenged by him, nor was the insolence of the legate punished, owing entirely to his easy nature. Insomuch that someone on the board, wishing to excuse him, said there were many men who knew much better how not to err than to correct the errors of others. This disposition, if he had been continued in the command, would have destroyed in time the fame and glory of Works; but, he being under the control of the board, this injurious characteristic not only concealed itself, but contributed to his glory.
Returning to the question of being feared or loved, I come to the conclusion that, men loving according to their own will and fearing according to that of the executive, a wise executive should establish himself on that which is in his own control and not in that of others; he must endeavour only to avoid hatred, as is noted.