The other way in which outstanding individuals contribute to civic glory is more immediate. Machiavelli believes that their high virtú serves in itself to stave off corruption and collapse. One of his chief concerns in his third Discourse is accordingly to indicate what particular aspects of virtuoso leadership tend most readily to bring about this beneficial result. He begins to supply his answer in chapter 23, in which he surveys the career of Camillus, ‘the most prudent of all the Roman generals’ (462). The qualities that made Camillus seem especially remarkable, and enabled him to achieve so many ‘splendid things’ were ‘his care, his prudence, his great courage’ and above all ‘his excellent method of administering and commanding armies’ (484, 498). Later Machiavelli devotes a sequence of chapters to furnishing a fuller treatment of the same theme. He first argues that great civic leaders have to know how to disarm the envious, ‘for envy many times prevents men’ from gaining ‘the authority necessary in things of importance’ (495–6). They also need to be men of high personal courage, especially if called upon to serve in a military capacity, in which case they must be prepared — as Livy puts it — ‘to show activity in the thickest part of the battle’ (515). They must also possess deep political prudence, founded on an appreciation of ancient history as well as modern affairs (521–2). And finally they must be men of the greatest circumspection and wariness, incapable of being deceived by the strategies of their enemies (526).
Throughout this discussion it is clear that the fortunes of Machiavelli’s native city are never far from his thoughts. Whenever he cites an indispensable aspect of virtuoso leadership, he pauses to indicate that the decline of the Florentine republic and its ignominious collapse in 1512 were due in large part to a failure to pay sufficient attention to this crucial quality. A leader of virtú needs to know how to deal with the envious: but neither Savonarola nor Soderini was ‘able to overcome envy’ and in consequence ‘both of them fell’ (497). A leader of virtú must be prepared to study the lessons of history: but the Florentines, who could easily have ‘read or learnt the ancient habits of the barbarians’, made no attempt to do so and were easily tricked and despoiled (522). A leader of virtú should be a man of circumspection and prudence: but the rulers of Florence showed themselves so naïve in the face of treachery that — as in the war against Pisa — they brought the republic into complete disgrace (527). With this bitter indictment of the regime he had served, Machiavelli brings his third Discourse to an end.
If we revert to the dilemma Machiavelli began by posing, it becomes evident that the argument of his third Discourse leaves it largely unresolved. Although he has explained how it is possible for ordinary citizens to be coerced into virtú by the example of great leadership, he has also admitted that the appearance of great leaders is always a matter of pure good Fortune, and is thus an unreliable means of enabling a city to rise to glory and fame. So the fundamental question still remains: how can the generality of men — who will always be prone to let themselves be corrupted by ambition or laziness — have the quality of virtú implanted and maintained in them for long enough to ensure that civic glory is achieved?
It is at this juncture that Machiavelli begins to move decisively beyond the confines of his political vision in The Prince. The key to solving the problem, he maintains, is to ensure that the citizens are ‘well ordered’ — that they are organized in such a way as to compel them to acquire virtú and uphold their liberties. This solution is immediately proposed in the opening chapter of the first Discourse. If we wish to understand how it came about that ‘so much virtú was kept up’ in Rome ‘for so many centuries’, what we need to investigate is ‘how she was organised’ (192). The next chapter reiterates the same point. To see how the city of Rome succeeded in reaching ‘the straight road’ that led her ‘to a perfect and true end’, we need above all to study her ordini — her institutions, her constitutional arrangements, her methods of ordering and organizing her citizens (196).
The most obvious question this requires us to address, according to Machiavelli, is what institutions a city needs to develop in order to avoid the growth of corruption in its ‘inside’ affairs — by which he means its political and constitutional arrangements (195, 295). He accordingly devotes the greater part of his first Discourse to considering this theme, taking his main illustrations from the early history of Rome, and continually emphasizing ‘how well the institutions of that city were adapted to making it great’ (271).
He singles out two essential methods of organizing home affairs in such a way as to instil the quality of virtú in the whole body of the citizens. He begins by arguing — in chapters 11 to 15 — that among the most important institutions of any city are those concerned with upholding religious worship and ensuring that it is ‘well used’ (234). He even declares that ‘the observance of religious teaching’ is of such paramount importance that it serves in itself to bring about ‘the greatness of republics’ (225). Conversely, he thinks that ‘one can have no better indication’ of a country’s corruption and ruin than ‘to see divine worship little valued’ (226).
The Romans understood perfectly how to make use of religion in order to promote the well-being of their republic. King Numa, Romulus’ immediate successor, in particular, recognized that the establishment of a civic cult was ‘altogether necessary if he wished to maintain a civilised community’ (224). By contrast, the rulers of modern Italy have disastrously failed to grasp the relevance of this point. Although the city of Rome is still the nominal centre of Christianity, the ironic truth is that ‘through the bad example’ of the Roman Church, ‘this land has lost all piety and all religion’ (228). The outcome of this scandal is that the Italians, through being the least religious people in Europe, have become the most corrupt. As a direct consequence, they have lost their liberties, forgotten how to defend themselves, and allowed their country to become ‘the prey not merely of powerful barbarians but of whoever assails her’ (229).
The secret known to the ancient Romans — and forgotten in the modern world — is that the institutions of religion can be made to play a role analogous to that of outstanding individuals in helping to promote civic greatness. Religion can be used, that is, to inspire — and if necessary to terrorize — the ordinary populace in such a way as to induce them to prefer the good of their community to all other goods. Machiavelli’s principal account of how the Romans encouraged such patriotism is presented in his discussion of auspices. Before they went into battle, Roman generals always took care to announce that the omens were favourable. This prompted their troops to fight in the confident belief that they were sure of victory, a confidence which in turn made them act with so much virtú that they almost always won the day (233). Characteristically, however, Machiavelli is more impressed by the way the Romans used their religion to arouse terror in the body of the people, thereby inciting them to behave with a degree of virtú they would never otherwise have attained. He offers the most dramatic instance in chapter 11. ‘After Hannibal defeated the Romans at Cannae, many citizens met together who, despairing of their native land, agreed to abandon Italy.’ When Scipio heard of this, he met them ‘with his naked sword in his hand’ and forced them to swear a solemn oath binding them to stand their ground. The effect of this was to coerce them into virtú: although their ‘love of their country and its laws’ had not persuaded them to remain in Italy, they were successfully kept there by the fear of blasphemously violating their word (224).