The attack on natural right in the name of history takes in most cases the following form: natural right claims to be a right that is discernible by human reason and is universally acknowledged; but history (including anthropology) teaches us that no such right exists; instead of the supposed uniformity we find an indefinite variety of notions of right or justice. Or, in other words, there cannot be natural right if there are no immutable principles of justice, but history shows us that all principles of justice are mutable. One cannot understand the meaning of the attack on natural right in the name of history, before one has realized the utter irrelevance of this argument. In the first place, “consent of all mankind” is by no means a necessary condition of the existence of natural right. Some of the greatest natural right teachers have argued that, precisely if natural right is rational, its discovery presupposes the cultivation of reason, and therefore natural right will not be known universally: one ought not even to expect any real knowledge of natural right among savages. In other words by proving diat there is no principle of justice diat has not been denied somewhere or at some time, one has not yet proven that any given denial was justified or reasonable. Furthermore, it has always been known that different notions of justice obtain at different times and in different nations. It is absurd to claim diat the discovery of a still greater number of such notions by modern students has in any way affected the fundamental issue.

This meeting, I gather, is concerned with the need for reinterpretation. I am not at all certain that reinterpretation is a universal necessity, i.e., that there cannot be final or definitive interpretations especially in those areas of historical research which are the most important. But I cannot go now into this difficult theoretical subject. I must limit myself to saying that the call for reinterpretation is dangerous practically. That call tells the historian: be original! Originality is very rare and the original historians do not have to be told to be original. As for the large majority of historians, they merely get bewildered by that call. Every one of us is probably flattered by the implication that we could be original if we only tried. This implication draws our attention away from our simple and urgent duties, the duties to be careful and thorough and to think straight. It would be also a great delusion to believe that the demand for novelty has made us more receptive to novel approaches: the resistance to genuine innovations as distinguished from fads is today as great as it was in the most benighted ages.

Many writers have attempted to describe the intention of The Prince by using the term “scientific.” This description is defensible, and even helpful, provided it is properly understood. The present article is meant to prepare such an understanding.

I. The Prince combines the characteristics of a treatise and a tract for the times.

Let us begin at the beginning. In the Epistle Dedicatory Machiavelli gives three indications of the subject-matter of the book: he has incorporated into it his knowledge of the actions of great men both modern and ancient; he dares to discuss princely government and to give rules for it; he possesses knowledge of the nature of princes. As appears from the Epistle Dedicatory, from the book itself, and from what the author says elsewhere, knowledge of the actions of great men, i.e., historical knowledge, supplies only materials for knowledge of what princely government is, of the characteristics of the various kinds of principalities, of the rules with which one has to comply in order to acquire and preserve princely power, and of the nature of princes.