Livy

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Titus Livius Patavinius was a patriot who believed in the "purer morality" of the Roman Empire and Republic that had sustained its existence for so long. He also saw, however, a gradual decline in morality and virtue over time as Roman society became richer and more prone to greed. As a result of this observation, he did not trust that any modern ruler would possess the moral integrity of the great leaders of the past, but perhaps if they read his book they could learn from the good examples and be warned by the bad ones. Machiavelli also agreed that history should be studied and applied to the present, but he believed that when people read Livy, they took “infinitely more pleasure in knowing the variety of incidents that are contained in [Livy’s writings], without ever thinking of imitating them.” In other words, Livy’s account of Rome was more of a glorified fairytale which no one could possibly use as a reference for solving current problems so he decided to write a commentary explaining what he believed to be the real reasons for the rise (and fall) of Rome. Both Livy and Machi...

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