Strengths And Weaknesses Of Renaissance Italy

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The Italian Renaissance brought a new and stimulating attitude to the table, with the concept of modern and ancient times combining through art and architecture and a society that wasn’t theological or scientific but centered on civics, posing questions about how humans ought to be or do. Renaissance Italy had been divided since the fall of Rome and with the different city-states governed by a wide variety of governments politics was extremely weak during that time. Niccolo Machiavelli wrote one of the most important documents in Renaissance Italy and history in general, The Prince, which dictated how leaders acted around him and could be interpreted as a guide to how the leaders should be acting. This document would be used as a blueprint for the unification of Italy but also proved to be of use to modern politicians when applied to the world we see today. The political weaknesses in Renaissance Italy were …show more content…

He focused on what is done and not what should be done. The writings of Thomas Aquinas and other medieval philosophers assimilated God’s will in the government of man, deeply intertwining morality and theology. Machiavelli worked hard to break the two apart in The Prince, noting how rulers either broke or kept the faith, observed treaties or didn’t. He commented on what successful leaders did, mainly highlighting how they kept authority, alluding to new monarchies that came about in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries. Machiavelli said a leader must be courageous like a lion but be able to spot trouble and adjust to cunningly like a fox, that a leader would preferably be both feared and loved but if there could only be one it was better to be feared. The Prince provided an outline for how Machiavelli wanted to unify Italy, with a focus on the functioning of new monarchies that were constructed throughout Europe, including the Holy Roman

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