ABSTRACT
Excluded from politics after the sufferings of the last few years and the disillusion of the last few months, now that the final seal seems to have been set on his sentence by the Pope’s ill-will and the Duke’s fatuous indifference, Machiavelli seeks solace and outlet for his talents in other ways. His leisure and his writings take on a colour which we might call more literary, if we did not see them as inspired by his misfortune. We have learnt to measure Machiavelli’s sufferings by his smiles no less than by his sighs; and now smiles and sighs suddenly fill his pages.
