§ 1. The mandates which are customarily delivered to Ambassadors in writing are called Instructions. I do not speak about those instructions; rather, I shall set forth in a brief method a general doctrine for Ambassadors, which can be taken from the civil doctrine that I have pursued thus far. For the sake of order, however, I shall explain the points individually.
Aphorism 1. For embassies in great affairs, the greatest men in the state must be sent. The greatest, I say, in prudence, integrity, and authority. The reason is manifest. For they represent their state and Prince, and it contributes greatly to his reputation that he possess the most excellent ministers possible. Princes, Ambassadors, and Councillors also revere these men, look up to them, and yield to their authority. For even rivals commend virtue—if not by loving it, certainly either by praising it openly or envying it secretly. Indeed, those to whom an embassy has been sent judge themselves honored by the arrival of a great man; they also begin to love the Prince whose minister they revere.
Aphorism 2. All the virtues are required in him, especially those which pertain to civil life. It is necessary for an Ambassador to possess them in a heroic degree. The pretense of virtue and cunning are hateful to all. Accordingly, those who are suspected and ill-reputed on that account must not be sent. For a man who sends a Cretan or a Cilician appears to wish to deceive, and thus a minister who is suspect obstructs the beginnings of actions. Moreover, those who are assailed by such an Ambassador possess two safeguards: one invincible, namely, to believe nothing; the other equal to his arts, namely, to oppose intricacies to intricacies and deceits to deceits.
Aphorism 3. The exceptional gifts and dignity of Ambassadors contribute little to the affair if they are hated by the Prince to whom they are sent. In this matter men often offend most gravely, when chief men through some affection confer an embassy upon one who is unsuitable for that person. For the man who receives the embassy rightly judges himself provoked when he sees a man thrust upon him and required to be treated honorably although he judges himself rightly offended with him and holds him suspect. Princes judge that this honor must be granted them: that they are not compelled to act and negotiate with an enemy. Indeed, it is repugnant even to the prudence of private persons to conciliate friendship and conduct affairs through the intervention of enemies.
They act just as though they attempted to solder metals together with earthenware. Hence arise impediments and delay in business; hence difficult access and other things which especially harm the Prince.
Aphorism 4. I require the highest prudence in an Ambassador; badly concealed craftiness customarily causes harm, as I have said. Very many at Courts are crafty, cunning, secretive, scrutinizers of the thoughts of others, investigators of all affairs, dissemblers, and obscure. One thing is upon their tongue, another in their mind; they say one thing with Titius and another with Gaius. Men judge them the most suitable for embassies because they know how to lie, deceive, and conceal by art; I judge them useless. For these vices are poisons of peace and friendship and can never be concealed for long. The King himself, the chief men, and spies from among the lesser men speak with an Ambassador. A disguise, worn away for a long time among many men by so many devices, cannot preserve the same color; a long fiction cannot prevent its lie from speaking through some part of itself. Thus the Ambassador loses trust, which is the foundation of an embassy, and incurs hatred or contempt, by which every benefit is shaken away. All his actions are rendered suspect; his faults are exaggerated. All prepare themselves against his cunning and deceits so as to elude them. Certainly, against deceitful men the invincible safeguard is not to believe them.
This class of men, therefore, neither preserves the mutual friendship of Princes nor deceives rivals. Fraud loses all its force where it is not believed. A Prince too loses authority through an embassy of this kind. A wolf, concerning the conclusion of a treaty with oxen, sent a little fox as Ambassador. When she had spoken at length concerning her sincerity, this answer was given: “Because it is manifest that you lie, we cannot trust your Prince.” Whatever an Ambassador does or says is judged to be done by the command or with the approval of the Prince. For it is known that all these things are written in full to the Prince either by the Ambassador or by his companions as things likely to please him.
Aphorism 5. Accordingly, I wish truth to be commended to an Ambassador, paying no heed to those who wittily define an Ambassador in these words: “a good man skilled in lying and prepared to lie for his state.” Truth is the foundation of the state, and an Ambassador sent to lie will readily lie even to his own Prince. Now so many Ambassadors are sent and reside everywhere, and at so great an expense, as existed in no age; nevertheless the benefit is slight, there are many offenses among Princes, and very many Ambassadors offend on each side and destroy themselves. For who discharges an embassy without being accused of παραπρεσβείας, misconduct in an embassy? Men are known who have only recently departed from prison. The reason is that they were sent to deceive. But God, detesting public frauds, turns punishments upon their ministers.
Certainly, since there is no lie which must not be covered by the veil of other lies lest it be revealed, it cannot happen that an Ambassador should either always lie consistently or regulate his deceits according to the mind of an absent lord. Thus it is necessary that, while lying, he disagree with his lord, whether that lord is truthful or deceitful. And because it is necessary to write everything home, it is arduous to lie so neatly that everything agrees with the intentions of the Prince and his Councillors.
Aphorism 6. The primary good in an Ambassador is fidelity, which elsewhere the Roman calls even the most sacred good of the human breast. Antiquity placed it in the Capitol near Jupiter. Certainly, the fidelity of few is firm if the hope of reward is absent or, on the other side, a greater reward is offered.
Παῦροι τοι πολλῶν πιστὸν ἔχουσι νόον.
Few among many possess a faithful spirit. In an Ambassador fidelity ought to be altogether unconquered. For it is often shaken by conference with Kings, by gifts, and even while it believes itself safe. I add threats and the fear of calumny. Amid so many methods, the danger that it may be enticed or shaken is very great, especially since the fortune of the Prince is often placed in the Ambassador’s hand.
For this reason the greatest Emperors frequently sent holy men, Bishops, and Priests as Ambassadors. Ambrose, Chrysostom, and Bernard discharged embassies.
Aphorism 7. Livy sometimes requires nobility of birth in an Ambassador, book 30. At times even Kings have been offended by the low condition of Ambassadors. But generous virtue and learning can supply its place. The Romans are certainly less to be approved when they sent back Ambassadors in whom little dignity appeared, for the person of the Ambassador must be estimated according to the dignity of those who send him. When Augustus learned that certain Ambassadors of Freedman stock had been sent, he refused them a place in the orchestra. Suetonius, chapter 44. But those Ambassadors belonged to cities and subject Provinces, which Augustus could admonish in this manner not to send unworthy men. Louis XI, King of France, sent Olivier the barber to Burgundy to seek a wife for his son. The matter was received as an insult, and it was not far from violence. But those were the arts of chief men who favored neither their King nor the Burgundian. Surgeons, shopkeepers, and artisans can certainly be sent if fortune has raised them to a more dignified station. Augustus himself, born of a father who was a money-changer, and other Caesars sprung from an ignoble nation and stock ought not to have labored fastidiously and rigidly in estimating another man’s nobility.
Justinian sent a Physician to Chosroes, King of the Persians, but one who had formerly treated the King and was therefore dear to him. The tutors of Crassus and Alexander were sent to them; they made peace and preserved cities.
Aphorism 8. Let him pursue courtesy in such a way that he flees flattery. Flattery is pleasing when it is not noticed; but if a wise Prince notices it, it is most hateful, for the man who praises him to his face reproaches him with vanity and folly. This appears especially in the Ambassador of a rival Prince, who generally praises for this reason: that he may deceive. I speak of flattering praise; for some praise is owed to a Prince and cannot be omitted without the reproach of incivility.
There is a remarkable example in the life of Charles V. A French Orator praised him intensely according to the custom of his nation, although a year before he had censured him most bitterly in England. The magnanimous Emperor answered him: “If a year ago you had censured me less in England, and now had praised me less, each would have been pleasing to me.” Thus the Orator lost trust and favor, and could accomplish nothing more useful for his King than to request a successor. Indeed, Ambassadors frequently offend their own Princes by being too profuse in the praises of foreigners. Before their own Princes they customarily excuse themselves in no other way than by censuring and ridiculing the men whom they praised, namely, by saying that they accommodated their speech to the inclinations of an empty Prince who had to be captured by those enticements. Princes are not ignorant that these things are done, and through secret friends they can learn what the Ambassadors have written.
I have treated flatterers elsewhere. I warn only that flattery is fitting to no one less than to
an Ambassador, both because he sustains the person of a Prince, whom it is impious to cast down and reduce to the rank of parasites, and because he cannot deceive, since he is judged to say nothing from his true mind. For unless flattery deceives, it harms its author. Whatever he has said in praise of the Prince is celebrated throughout the entire Court, not without addition, and is therefore carried out into public and brought to the Prince who sent him. Timagoras was accused because, contrary to the institutions of his fatherland, he had adored the King of the Persians. Demacles was fined ten talents because he had worshiped Alexander as a god.
Aphorism 9. Let him regulate ceremonies in such a way that he is not ridiculed for being excessive in them and therefore becomes wearisome. For that excessive elegance of gestures belongs to a dissembler and hypocrite. Now the observance of ceremonies in going, sitting, addressing, and visiting is reckoned almost among the principal cares of Ambassadors. Nor is it remarkable that no less danger arises from those empty things than from an embassy badly conducted. Even if he has conducted the affair for which he was sent most wisely, most faithfully, and indeed most successfully, if he has slipped in some ceremony, he will learn at his own peril how arduous it is to be an Ambassador. This is an ancient evil. Arsaces killed Orobazus because in a conference he had yielded the more honorable place to Sulla. But I omit these things. I ask all Princes not to be avengers of such errors: let them care for serious things and pass over empty ones.
Aphorism 10. The prudence of an Ambassador consists in this: that he not be captured by the immense allurement of ceremonies, honors, banquets, processions, and words, and that he not judge things which belong to deceit and mockery to be signs of love and reverence. Remember: pretense is more laborious than truth. It is arduous for an Ambassador to distinguish honor from mockery and kindness from fraud. Here the magnitude of the things which are offered must not be estimated, nor their prices; true courtesy, secure in its own sincerity, requires few things. A genuine thole-pin is made by easy art; a painted one is completed by much labor and varied color. But what are the signs of true honor, and what the indications of mockery? The matter will disclose itself to a prudent man. If the honor is excessive, it is false. If the Prince does not love the Ambassador, no one among the ministers speaks well of him in his absence; no one honors him except feignedly. He will discover this through his own ministers and the servants of other chief men. He himself will also consider with no lack of care the causes of the honor which is due.
Aphorism 11. Above all, he will avoid pride, a vice hateful in all men; but when it is seen in an Ambassador, it impedes the conduct of affairs and then brings infamy upon the Prince. For what sort of Prince can endure so swollen a minister? Why did they send so insane a man to us? Are these the customs of that whole nation? Is it not better to wage war with such men than to tolerate their arrogance? Indeed, let him also consider that all pride is akin to folly. Its origin teaches that it is no small portion of folly, for pride is contained in three very great faults: ignorance of oneself, of others, and of human affairs. It obscures reason, so that it not only judges nothing well but disturbs judgment in the most perverse manner. Concerning his own affairs let him relate nothing, and concerning the affairs of his Prince let him relate everything, with moderation—but very rarely. Let him never dare to censure the vices of the nation among which he dwells. Each is hateful: the former through a display of power, the latter through reproaching vices. It was truly said:
Ἀλαζονείας οὔτις ἐκφεύγει δίκην.
No one escapes the punishment of boastfulness. The first punishment is that a braggart is not believed; the second, that he is hated.
Aphorism 12. In presenting the demands of his Prince, let him be industrious and announce his arrival promptly. No answer was given to the Ambassadors of the Illyrians because they had not announced themselves to the Senate. In exacting an answer, let him be neither inflexible, as Popilius was when he drew a circle around Antiochus, nor disdainful, like Callicratides. Sent by the Spartans to Cyrus to request money as a loan, Callicratides preferred to depart without accomplishing the affair rather than request a conference three times. Princes are necessarily offended by so unyielding a manner of proceeding. For what sort of disposition was that of Xenocrates, who declared that he would take no food before an answer was given? The servant of Abraham had done this previously; but matters had then advanced so that they recognized all things as divinely ordained.
Aphorism 13. It has been asked whether an Ambassador may receive gifts. Some employ a distinction: gifts offered for the sake of kindness, not for corruption, can be accepted. But this is not the state of the controversy. For it is fixed and settled that it is lawful for no good man to accept gifts for the sake of corrupting either fidelity or justice; and therefore it is not necessary to admonish an Ambassador concerning this. The question, accordingly, concerns gifts which are given for the sake of honor and friendship alone. Some permit them, others deny them. Truth lies in the middle way. Sometimes they must be refused; at other times they must be accepted.
Aphorism 14. Although gifts are offered under the appearance of kindness and honor, nevertheless, if there is a suspicion that something else also lies concealed—namely, that they are being brought up like battering-rams, by a secret device, to shake fidelity loose—they must altogether be rejected. For in this matter not only sin but even ruinous suspicions are dangerous. It is foreign to the duty of a good and prudent man to nourish such wicked hopes; certainly, those who hope that he can be corrupted condemn him as a wicked man. Accordingly, an Ambassador will never squander his reputation here by placing it after money. In this class there is always also the danger that he may be punished by his own state—even if not as unfaithful, nevertheless as one whom it rightly holds suspect. Those suspicions extend very widely: they belong first to the Ambassador himself, then to the state, his companions, hosts, rivals, and those who may at some time become enemies and therefore slanderers, against all of whom the gifts will sometimes have to be defended. Demosthenes most excellently refused Philip’s gifts; Aeschines most wickedly accepted them. Pelopidas laudably despised the royal gifts of the Persians; Timagoras paid for those he accepted with death.
Aphorism 15. When gifts are forbidden by the law of the fatherland, they must never be accepted. At Athens and Corinth it was provided by severe laws that an Ambassador should not accept gifts. The Most Serene State of the Venetians imitates these laws even today. The Romans gave gifts to Ambassadors coming to them and did not forbid their own Ambassadors to be honored with gifts, except when they were suspect, as when they were offered by Pyrrhus, Antiochus, or Jugurtha.
Nevertheless, it is very rare that the fidelity of Ambassadors is attacked openly and, as it were, by manifest bargaining. Men employ a more concealed art: they allege benevolence and their estimation of the virtue shining in the Ambassador. From four classes of arguments he will readily conjecture which are true gifts, which suspect, and which ἄδωρα, no gifts in truth: from the person of each Prince, from his own person, and from the kind of gifts.
Suspicion arises from the person of the giver if a rival who is parsimonious or needy makes great largesses; if he does so beyond custom, law, or usage; if he has not given to others or has given less; if he did not formerly love the Ambassador and the embassy carries with it no occasion for new love; if he extends singular favor to him; if he asks for services in general; if the Ambassador can bring him an advantage; or if the Ambassador is confident that he can assign no cause for the unusual liberality except that a return service must be rendered.
Next, he will consider the person of the Prince by whom he was sent. Is that Prince accustomed to be generous toward Ambassadors? Does he do this gratuitously and from benevolence, or in truth so that he may capture Councillors? For what he himself does, he will suspect is done by others. Is he accustomed to rejoice if he receives his own men enriched by gifts? Is he suspicious by nature? To this also pertains the mind and judgment of the Councillors, who very often envy their colleagues. No matter is nearer to slander than when the ministers of Princes are beholden to other Princes, especially rivals. Indeed, things which are approved at present are rendered criminal by a change of times. An apology of the aged Barnevelt has been published, in which he complains sorrowfully that gifts received by him from the Spanish after the truce was made are cast against him, while others who had received no smaller gifts are not even named. But calamity made this man guilty; fortune raised the others. And so those glittering with Spanish gold condemned the wretched man for the gold he had taken. For when a man is falling, even accidental things—and indeed clothes and arms, which customarily afford protection—drive him down more violently.
From his own person he will gather the mind of another. He should be suspicious if the favor is neither pleasing nor proportionate to the gifts; if otherwise he labors under suspicion of δωροδοκίας, bribery, or of avarice; if he sees men more worthy than himself neglected; if he perceives that he possesses very great influence with the Prince, or that others judge it so. For if a corrupted man is thought to possess little influence, they do not judge the crime worth the trouble. I saw a certain Councillor ruined for this reason: when his Prince had turned aside to a wealthy city, all the others were indeed received honorably, but he alone was cultivated by private banquets and gifts, though not openly, and was chosen, as it were, as guardian of the city. When this was made known at Court, it brought indignation, suspicion, investigation, and finally destruction.
As regards gifts, two kinds are suspect: immense and perpetual. Immense gifts are enticements or wages of perfidy—for example, if one hundred thousand gold pieces are given to a man who could have been sent back content with a golden cup, or if a perpetual pension of ten thousand is established for one to whom a capital of ten thousand appears to be a great income. These are earnest-payments for perfidy and covenants of servitude. Princes are not customarily so profuse as to pay out one hundred thousand if they can discharge the obligation with ten thousand, especially since liberality toward one man is drawn into a precedent by comparison both among subjects and among foreigners. The most suspect of all are secret gifts. But they can be concealed by Ambassadors only with the greatest difficulty. For although none of their friends learns of them, they are certainly known to the Councillors of the man who gave them. I remember that, when a great man, though not impregnable to gold, had received from a Prince an immense silver vessel and delivered it to his wife for safekeeping, not without praise of the giver, she imprudently disclosed the matter. For, setting the cup upon the ground, she placed her eight-year-old son beside it to test whether his stature equaled it. Without delay, the boy boasted among his companions concerning so great a cup and so great a friend of his father. The matter was learned by rivals; the cup was brought forth, and the man was cast down from his dignity.
Aphorism 16. If those causes are absent, gifts can and sometimes ought to be accepted, lest either the gifts themselves or the Princes appear to be despised. Gifts are customarily given even to enemy Ambassadors, and this appears, as it were, an ornament attached to the law of nations: although they come from an enemy and return to an enemy, they are not only safe but also honored. For they are mediators of peace, and although peace is not concluded, the will for peace is nevertheless worthy of reward. Indeed, even if they come to declare war, for that declaration too belongs to common justice, and the man who comes to declare war first proposes conditions of peace.
I shall add one thing. I have seen immense royal gifts which made an Ambassador an enemy. For when the man heard himself ill-spoken of among his own people because of the gold he had accepted, to remove that suspicion he everywhere opposed the interests of the King and endeavored to prove his alienation to his own Prince by casting forth reproaches and insults. So slippery a matter it is to tempt the fidelity of another man’s minister with gifts.
Aphorism 17. It is the duty of an Ambassador to reread and meditate most diligently upon his mandate or instruction. If any question arises, let him ask. If it contains a perplexed judgment and conceals the mind of the Prince, let him refuse the embassy in whatever manner he can, lest he be held in mockery. If he possesses free mandates, the greatest care is needed so that he may know the mind of the Prince. If they are certain and defined, he ought not to pass beyond their bounds—not only lest he offend the Prince, but much more lest he appear to have corrected the Councillors. For although the Prince, appeased by the fortunate outcome of affairs, will hold as ratified and pleasing that which was performed better abroad than it had been deliberated at home, nevertheless some of the Councillors will grieve more at the correction of their own judgments than at the public loss which was feared from them. For from this they foretell disgrace for themselves and advancement for another. To most men the public good is of less value than private good. Those who wish to slander will not lack an occasion. Aelian relates in book 6 that Ambassadors of the Athenians who had successfully completed an affair in Arcadia were killed for this reason alone: that they returned by a road different from the one they had been ordered to take. Accordingly, it will rarely be lawful to depart from a mandate, for one man will not without danger change that which was deliberated long and much in a common council.
Aphorism 18. Nevertheless, circumstances sometimes occur such that the mind of the Prince must be preserved and no account taken of the mandate. First, new mandates suited to the affairs to be conducted must be awaited. If the matter requires speed, the will of the Prince must be obeyed rather than his word. This is what the Athenians customarily added as a final clause: if the Ambassadors could accomplish any other good thing, they should do it. Some extend this to whatever can render the affair of the one giving the mandate better; but it is hazardous. For Princes often serve reputation and other things more than their own advantage.