Machiavelli And Lao Tzu Comparison Essay

1120 Words5 Pages
Two in the Same (A comparison between Machiavelli and Lao Tzu’s view of government) Love, fear, happiness, sorrow and excitement are all different emotions that we experience throughout our lives. They’re often so powerful that they help us decide on matters without us even realizing it. Emotions are a huge part of who we are, so many leaders of the world use the emotions of the people to get where they need to be. One question that has been raised is whether or not it is better to be loved or feared as a leader. Machiavelli, in his work Prince, discusses how it is better to be feared while Lao Tzu’s work Thoughts from the Tao-te Ching, believe that love is far more superior. Although these two texts seem at different ends of the spectrum,…show more content…
With being a leader, there must come an understanding of the people that you are leading. Overall, it is completely unrealistic to expect people to be absolutely loyal, loving, and true to you as a leader. Although you can with for this to happen, it’s not part of human nature for people to not want to get ahead and gain their own power and control. Through the entire work of Lao Tzu, it is expressed how people are always wanting more, but life would be easier if we weren’t always so demanding and just simply went with the flow of things. This is also expressed in Prince, “For a man who wishes to make a vocation of being good all the time will come to ruin among so many who are not good.” From within in both works, we as readers can understand how the authors know that people can’t always be trustworthy, even though we would like to think they are. Myrtle Langley’s article discusses more in detail how people act and how that comes into play as you are ruling. She expresses how people grow up always wanting more power, more control, and more say in whatever is happening. The information shown demonstrates how both leaders of the works understand how people act and how this effects how they
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