Humility and humanity: Machiavelli's rejection and appropriation of a Christian Ideal 1

Abstract

Though Machiavelli is famous for advising the mere ‘appearance’ of certain Christian and classical virtues (P XVIII), Machiavellian virtù inherits the legacy (though neither the content nor the telos) of the Christian virtue of humility, a virtue that is not present in pagan Roman accounts of heroism. I am not contending that Machiavelli is a Christian nor that he is continuing a Christian principle. Rather, I am asserting in this article that Machiavelli secularises the distinctly Christian virtue of humility, particularly in its affinity with the virtue of compassion, and that this is particularly true in his Discourses on Livy. To demonstrate how this is so, I compare Machiavelli's treatment of the Roman hero Brutus in the Discourses on Livy to the retelling of the life of Rome's liberator in Augustine's City of God.

Keywords

Machiavelli Augustine Discourses on Livy humility

The virtue of humility enjoys a contentious status in political theory's history and practice and in contemporary political discourse. Conflicts over this virtue's worthiness often cite its seeming passivity, impracticality, or disingenuousness; as Nietzsche (1996: Part I. Aphorism 87) perceptively writes, it is often the case that ‘He that humbleth himself wishes to be exalted’.² Contemporary political theorists find in humility both a medieval scourge and a way forward. While admitting that Christianity ‘since the age of St. Augustine has celebrated a self-effacing humility’ as a virtue,³ towards the end of his book The Stillborn God Mark Lilla (2008: 47–48) calls for humility towards those espousing political theologies. Dana Villa (2001: xi) argues for a kind of Socratic epistemic humility rooted in ‘intellectual doubt at the heart of moral reflection’ as a form of good citizenship in contemporary liberalism. At the same time as these developments, the relationship between humility and epistemology has found its crystallisation in the influential Rawlsian concept of the veil of ignorance, which encourages individuals to abstract out of their particular characteristics to craft just policies (Rawls, 2005: 136–142). The rhetoric and debate surrounding current issues such as immigration, health care, and the justice of international markets possess, ancillary to questions of justice, questions about the need for a type of humility which encourages us to identify and empathise with the less fortunate party of each dispute, in order to arrive at humane and prudent policy conclusions.

On the other hand, though many contemporary thinkers urge a second look at humility, the question of its utility, famously raised by Hume, remains with us today both in explicit rejections of its usefulness⁴ and in dramatic modifications from its original character.⁵ When Hume (1902: V. I. 176) states that the ‘monkish virtue’ of humility fails to ‘advance a man's fortune in the world’ or to ‘render him a more valued member of society’, he recalls political thinkers to the facts on the ground. What is the real value of humility in political and social life?

Normative political realism, a tradition claiming both Machiavelli and Augustine as adherents, suggests ‘that political theory should begin…. not with the explication of moral ideals…which are then taken to settle the questions of value and principle in the political realm but in an …understanding of the practice of politics itself’ (Rossi and Sleat, 2014: 690, 697). In this regard, it would seem that humility is only salient insofar as it effects politics. Its Christian incarnation is nearly unilaterally challenged by both deniers of humility's worth and the virtue's modifiers as possessing little political value.⁶ However, returning to Nietzsche's unmasking of humility, Williams (2002: 15) reminds us that though Nietzsche believed that Christian virtues were no longer tenable for ‘thoughtful people’, the ‘secularized political forms’ of Christianity have yet to lose the allegiance of contemporary persons.

Humility's inescapable draw is reason enough to try to understand the virtue's changing face and its political relevance. Amid all our disagreements about humility's usefulness and character, this article attempts to situate Machiavelli, commonly depicted as humility's foe, as a figure who critiques, modifies, and secularises humility in a way that still influences us. Though Machiavelli (1985) famously advises the mere ‘appearance’ of Christian and classical virtues, Machiavellian virtù inherits the legacy (though neither the content nor the telos) of Christian humility, an unrepresented virtue in pagan Rome.⁷ I am not contending that Machiavelli is a Christian, nor that he continues a Christian principle. Rather, Machiavelli secularises the distinctly Christian virtue of humility, particularly in his Discourses on Livy, where the focus on talent rather than heredity, the preferential treatment of the poor, and the committing of violent deeds for the common good become expressions of humility reconceived as humanity.

The comparison between Machiavelli and Augustine is well founded, not only through their reflections on humility and realism, but because of the connections noted between Augustinian philosophy and Machiavelli's thought. De Grazia (1989: 31, 53, 64, 120) notes similarities between Machiavelli's texts and the City of God and On Christian Doctrine, asserting that Machiavelli reflected upon the bishop's prose. He also claims that Machiavelli

turns the tables on Augustine. In the City of God, the great bishop puts the state on the defensive by charging that without justice states are but greater robber bands. Niccolò now puts the church on defensive accusing it of corrupting its spiritual message.

Fontana (1999: 658) states that Machiavelli transmutes Christian caritas ‘in a radical and subversive move’ from its Augustinian foundation of the ‘philosophical and metaphysical distinction between the earthly city and the City of God’ to a secularised charity. Wolin (2006: 187–188) also draws a comparative portrait of the two, claiming that prior to Machiavelli ‘none, save Augustine, had asserted these evils to be inherent in the nature of political action’. He contrasts Augustine's Romulus to Machiavelli's Romulus as a revelatory tool for understanding both thinkers.

For Augustine the vile acts committed by Romulus in laying the foundations of Roman power constituted a political version of the drama of original sin….Machiavelli was not ignorant of this charge but argued that the ends of national greatness legitimized Romulus's deeds.

Continuing Wolin's (2006: 188) insight that a ‘single example…provides a measure of the distance between one age and another’, I compare Machiavelli's treatment of Brutus in the Discourses to the retelling of his life in Augustine's City of God.⁸ Brutus is notable to interpreters of Machiavelli and Augustine⁹ because he is of tremendous significance for both thinkers, exemplifying a key political teaching in each of their texts.¹⁰ For Augustine, Brutus demonstrates the City of Man's relentless drive of the libido dominandi. For Machiavelli, Brutus represents force and fraud's fusion – the fox who feigns insanity to liberate Rome, and the lion who executes his sons to preserve it.

Augustine's most fundamental critique of Rome's hero is that his pride destroys the familial bonds and the bonds of friendship needed for political life. Brutus is too filled with pride to rule for the common benefit; a wake of destruction follows his path. Machiavelli sees in Brutus, however, something akin to humility – something I euphemistically refer to as humanity (umanità). Umanità, while excluding many aspects of Christian humility, draws on Christianity's conceptual resources to allow its practitioner to act for the common benefit without partiality. To do this, one must endure assaults against one's honour and see beyond class and family distinctions. Oddly enough, while Machiavelli's anthropology is best expressed in the maxim that people ‘desire to acquire’ (Machiavelli, 1985: Ch. III), his most heroic character is depicted as a man who is cruel to be merciful and is inexplicable solely in terms of self-interest. This leaves Machiavelli's reader to discover a secularised, violent humility in his writings, a virtue that at once inherits from and questions the Christian tradition.

The phenomenology of Machiavellian humility

Normative realism often finds a common bedfellow in philosophies viewing the political and social as fundamental components of the human condition (Rossi and Sleat 2014: 694, citing Newey (2013) and Rossi (2010)). The content of these philosophies, however, while sharing the Aristotelian heritage of the interest in the human, can differ dramatically, oftentimes because of varying moral psychologies, as Williams (2002: 24) reminds us. The psychology behind Machiavelli's philosophy observes the conflict between the moral and the expedient and questions morality's light of this conflict. Because of the seeming disparity between the expedient and the virtuous, Coady (1993: 375) writes, Machiavelli attempts to incorporate the expedient into the moral, contending that what is needed for the political community may itself constitute morality. Machiavelli's standard for ethical human behaviour becomes umanità. Benner (2009: 204–206) convincingly argues that Machiavelli urges statesmen to practice umanità; instead, however, his contemporaries ‘oscillate between trying to build cities suitable for incorruptible beings, that is, gods, and when this fails – as it always does – building to subhuman standards’.

According to Benner, an important aspect of the humane for Machiavelli is the practice of a humility allowing men and women to judge the worth of things correctly, without the corruption of inflated beliefs in our own ability or mistaken attachments to opinions one may wish were true. The Machiavellian must take the true estimation of things, avoiding the Icarus-like pride of building divine cities or the tyrannical pride of the libido dominandi. The ancient Greek pedigree behind Machiavelli's political philosophy is key in understanding his modification of humility into umanità (and the retention of a component of humility within the virtue of being humane). His treatment of humility is influenced by the Greek idea of hubris, a concept

sometimes used to describe unruly plants or animals, but also refers to wanton or licentious conduct in human beings who fail to respect proper bounds (deon) especially in relation to others. In this regard, to commit hubris may mean to outrage, assault or wantonly violate, usually because of poorly restrained passions, ambitions, or desires for more than one's share (pleonexia). (Benner, 2009: 81)

As argued in Xenophon's Hiero, a probable text of influence for Machiavelli,¹¹ dissimulation is a useful tool for guiding a prince away from hubris and pleonexia towards humility, if not for leading him to the virtue's internalisation. Machiavelli appears to learn from Xenophon that the best way to restore order is to persuade the tyrant to abstain from domination by appealing to his interest, using dissimulation and the restraint of tact, rather than bluster or an appeal to right, to lead the tyrant to the city's good. Oddly enough, in order to guide leaders to humility's restraint, Machiavelli appeals to the desire for glory. Of further interest is the fact that dissimulation may rely on humility because the dissembler must take on a guise potentially incommensurate with their ability, intelligence, or estimation of their own greatness. The most perfect practitioner of umanità views themself plainly, seeing the limitations of their own entitlement in relationship to the freedom of others (Benner, 2009: 497). Even if the typical prince is unable to internalise this virtue and is only able to be restrained through good orders, umanità – influenced by humility – is essential to founders, philosophers, and statesmen.

As mentioned earlier, one concrete manifestation of this virtue is the willingness to dissimulate, to conceal the truth so that one's own talent is obscured. Machiavelli (like Augustine) believes a central component of humility is the rejection of heredity's tie to virtue. When Machiavelli (mis)quotes a passage from Dante's Purgatorio, writing ‘Rarely does human probity descend by the branches/and this He wills who gives it/that it be called for from him’, he could find another Christian voice in Augustine who claims that ‘it is just to judge people by their character and not their heredity’. Even given this agreement between Machiavelli and Augustine, the role of humility in Machiavelli is different from Christian humility. The connation of the word humility (not the concept of umanità inspired by a modified version of umilità) in Machiavelli is one of weakness and leads to a loss of esteem for the virtue's practitioner (Machiavelli, 1996: II.14.1 and II.2). This version of humility cannot be combined with humanity. For Augustine (1998: IX.5), humanity and humility are identical; they both stem from compassion (compatior – fellow feeling): ‘And what is compassion but a kind of fellow feeling in our hearts for the misery of another?’.¹² To be able to experience compassion, we must love our neighbour as our self, mindful that one is not greater in God's eyes than any other human. People lose their humanity when they are unable to feel for the sufferings of another (Augustine, 1998: XIV.9).

Augustinian humility, described in Machiavellian politics, often means that one is not humane; fellow feeling from turning into action. Machiavelli claims in Book II.14 of the Discourses’ title that ‘Men Deceive Themselves Believing That through Humility They Will Conquer Pride’. Machiavelli depicts Roman ‘patience’ towards the Latins threatening Rome's Samnite allies as a form of humility, a show of weakness exposing the Romans to Latin contempt. Again, in Discourses Book II .2, Machiavelli compares Roman sacrifices magnificence to the Catholic Eucharist's delicate ‘humility.’ Catholicism has ‘placed the highest good in humility, abjectness, and contempt of things human’ while the Romans ‘placed it in greatness of spirit, strength of body, and all other things capable of making men very strong’.

In what sense, then, can one speak of a Machiavellian counterpart to Christian humility when he explicitly rejects humility as pernicious?¹³ While Machiavelli rejects Christian humility's passive aspects, he does not abandon Augustine's account of fellow feeling. If ancient morality did not honour ‘solicitude to the sufferings of others’ as a virtue, Machiavelli, like the Christian, does. He transmutes the virtue of humility into this worldly virtue of umanità, which, like Christian humility, is related to compassion and mercy towards those who suffer; yet he eviscerates pietà (piety) from what it means to be humane (Orwin, 1978: 1222, 1224). In doing so, he relies on aspects of the Christian inheritance, though he rejects much of it.

Though it would seem, then, that Machiavellian umanità is devoid of Christian umilità, this is incorrect for two reasons. Firstly, umanità relies on umilità’s appearance, if not the possession of the virtue itself (Machiavelli, 1985: Chapter XVIII), so umanità participates in umilità by emulation. For example, at one point Machiavelli seems to use humility and humanity interchangeably when warning against changing quickly between humility and pride in Discourses Book I.41. He cautions against moving from humility to pride in the title, and in the body of the text he expresses the same teaching, juxtaposing the word ‘humane’ with the word ‘proud’.

More importantly, the insight that one should be sensitive to others’ suffering regardless of their birth requires humility. Famously, Machiavelli uses the Virgin Mary's praise for the Christian God as his own words of praise for his depiction of King David, ‘who filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty’. Mary recognises and praises God's humility and is held by Christians to possess the virtue herself. Another example of the relationship between humility and humanity occurs in the preface to Discourses Book I. When Machiavelli entreats the Discourses’ readers to consider ‘humanely’ what he completed for the ‘common benefit’, he asks them to forget his low birth, his exile, and his bad fortune – in short, he asks them to practice humility, to have ‘mercy’ on him and to approach his thought on its own merits. Moreover, he wants his readers to recognise he worked ‘without any respect, for those things [which] will bring common benefit to everyone’, common benefit being a stable political system benefiting all citizens.¹⁴

Strictly speaking, Machiavelli never refers to Brutus as humane. Anyone who has read Machiavelli, however, knows that to act for the common benefit is to be cruel to be kind. Distancing himself sharply from Christianity while relying on its original insight, Machiavelli (1996: I.9) examines what it means to be merciful in the typical manner he uses for considering things – he looks to the effect. The Christian reformers St. Francis of Assisi and St. Dominic (Machiavelli, 1996: III.1, emphasis mine):

with poverty and with the example of the life of Christ…

brought back into the minds of men what had already been

eliminated there. Their new orders were so powerful that they

are the cause that the dishonesty of the prelates and of the

heads of the religion do not ruin it. Living still in poverty and

having so much credit with people's in confessions and sermons,

they give them to understand that it is evil to say evil of evil, and

that it is good to live under obedience to them and, if they make

an error, to leave them for God to punish.

The consequence of this is that clergy ‘do the worst they can, because they do not fear the punishment that they do not see and do not believe’, hell. Christian humility is politically damaging because it relies on caritas ‘for love is held by a chain of obligation, which, because men are wicked, is broken at every opportunity for their own utility’ (Machiavelli, 1985: Ch. XVII). While Christian love is unreliable, ‘fear is held by a dread of punishment that never forsakes you’, and the abusive Catholic clergy Machiavelli critiques experience neither love nor fear of God. Though Francis and Dominic exhibit true humility, this virtue, especially when imitated by the common people ‘rendered the world weak and given it in prey to criminal men, who can manage it securely, seeing that the collectivity of men, so as to go to paradise, think more of enduring their beatings than of avenging them’ (Machiavelli, 1996: II.2).

To understand Machiavellian humility it is helpful to illustrate an example Machiavelli condemns, his friend Piero Soderini, who ruined his fatherland through traditional humility. When Soderini became gonfaloniere, he deceived himself by believing he could ‘overcome with his patience and goodness the appetite that was in the sons of Brutus [those sympathetic toward or a part of a previous regime] for returning to another government’. Though Soderini understood the necessity of austerity after Savonarola's execution in order to keep the Medici at bay,¹⁵ he failed to act accordingly, believing he could persuade ambitious enemies through patience and goodness, worrying that if he acted unilaterally the Florentine's would lose faith in the gonfaloniere’s office.¹⁶ ‘Such respect on the part of the Florentines for the institution of gonfaloniere, Machiavelli writes, ‘was wise and good…Nonetheless he should never allow an evil to run loose out of respect for a good, when that good could easily be crushed by that evil’ (Machiavelli, 1996: III.3).

Because all things are judged by their end, Soderini could have manipulated appearances so that his unilateral action seemed the result of patriotism rather than ambition. As to his concern about the institution's integrity, in time he could install checks against tyranny for his successor.

But his first opinion deceived him, as he did not know that malignity is not tamed by time or appeased by any gift. So much so that, through not knowing how to be like Brutus, he lost not only his fatherland but his state and reputation.

Fighting the temptation for unilateral rule to protect the government, and seeking to persuade rather than to annihilate enemies, requires a form of humility. However, Soderini's humility is not guided by a consideration of the final end of stability. For Soderini, humility mandates the practice of mercy and cannot be chosen by a cross-benefit analysis.

On the other hand, as we see in the next section, Brutus's humility is governed by prudence. This is the difference between the education of Brutus and the Christian education of Soderini. But before we consider Brutus’ relationship to humility in Machiavelli's writings, let us consider the example of Pistoia, a city referred in both the Prince and the Discourses. Pistoia was a divided city outside of Florence, assailed by two warring families. ‘The Florentines who had to settle them’ had recourse to the middle way of dealing with a divided city; instead of killing the leaders of the tumults or exiling them, the Florentines attempted to broker peace between the two parties. While this approach appeared to be the most humble (because it avoided overtaking Pistoia's government) and the most humane (because it did not entail leaders’ murder or exile), in truth it was unmerciful (Machiavelli, 1996: III.27). However, Cesare Borgia's seeming cruelty to the Romagna ‘was much more merciful than the Florentine people, who so to escape a name for cruelty, allowed Pistoia to be destroyed’ (Machiavelli, 1985: Ch. XVII).

In the case of Pistoia, Florentine humility extended the destruction; like Soderini, the Florentines humbleness was most unmerciful. What does Machiavelli envision a ‘humane humility’ to be?

Humanity in Machiavelli's Brutus

In Machiavelli's Brutus we see force and fraud's perfection, and while his analysis of Brutus could not be more different from Augustine's, Machiavelli's Brutus does exhibit a strange type of the virtue extolled by him. Recall that Augustine's humility leads to the internalisation and understanding of others' feelings, as well as to self-sacrifice. For Machiavelli, the implications of this secularised virtue are politically important, and while not signs of or imitations of providence, the practice of this virtue compensates for the things providence fails to provide.

The importance of humility as an aspect of virtù is obscured not only by Machiavelli's explicit teaching that it can be foregone¹⁷ but also by his discussion of Fortuna. Prior to Brutus's introduction, Machiavelli spends several chapters uncovering fortuna and virtù’s relationship. While fortune's power is tremendous, it is countered and harnessed by virtù, and most often Fortuna's dominance signifies human failure. Brutus becomes Machiavelli's representative of fortune's subjugation in a slowly emerging portrait. Machiavelli first writes in a chapter entitled ‘Fortune Blinds the Spirits of Men When It Does Not Wish Them to Oppose Its Plans,’ that the heavens do not ‘provide’ against contingencies, even in a city filled with virtù like Rome (Machiavelli, 1996: II.29). He attributes to Livy the belief that heaven thwarted the Romans so they could know human power's limits, an argument similar to the one in Books I–V of the City of God,¹⁸ and offers the examples of war with the Gauls following the hubris of the Fabii. The absence of a good general because of the exiling of Camilus to Ardea and the failure of the tribunes to scout their camp location are also mentioned as examples of Providence throwing dirt in Roman eyes.

This chapter, however, follows another chapter entitled ‘How Dangerous It Is for a Republic or a Prince Not to Avenge an Injury Done against the Public or against a Private Person’, which offers a different account of the Fabii's error. After the Tuscans ask for aid against the French, the Fabii travel as diplomats to the French to dissuade them from attacking Rome's allies. During this visit, the Tuscans and Gauls battle, and the Fabii intervene on the side of the Tuscans. Dishonoured, the French sent diplomats to Rome asking that the brothers be handed over for punishment. Not only did the Senate disregard this request, they elevated the Fabii to tribunes. The Gauls respond by taking Rome.

The Fabii's story is followed by another example of vengeance and destruction preventable by prudence, the story of the Macedonian youth Pausanias who was lusted after by King Philip's advisor, Attalus. Machiavelli (1996: I.28) opines in this section that

[t]his example is very similar to that of the Romans and notable for whoever governs. For he should never esteem a man so little that he believes that when he adds injury on top of injury, he who is injured will not think of avenging himself with every danger and particular harm for himself.

Pausanias kills Philip because the King fails to punish Attalus for gang raping him. In fact, Philip not only overlooked Attalus' offense, but made him Greece's governor. The enraged Pausanias kills Philip on the wedding day of the Macedonian princess to Alexander of Epirus.

It seems, then, that fortune may not cause the fall of regimes. Fortune, it turns out, is not much of a foe when virtue is strong.¹⁹ Machiavelli tells us in Book II.30 that

where men have little virtue, fortune shows its power very much; and because it is variable, republics and states often vary and will always vary until someone emerges who is so much a lover of antiquity that he regulates it in such a mode that it does not have cause to show at every turning of the sun how much it can do.

The hubris that does not consider the ruling class's offenses as a serious threat to stability and a certain kind of political virtue is capable of checking this threat. While it is true that for Machiavelli all people value self-preservation, offended persons, desiring ‘not to be oppressed’, will throw away their lives in pursuit of recognition and the avenging of their dignity (Machiavelli, 1996: II.28). It turns out, then, that an important aspect of the virtù that counters fortune is a humility that can internalise another's needs, distancing oneself from one's seemingly most immediate needs.

While different from Christian humility, what Machiavelli praises as an aspect of virtù does not appear to be merely comprised of force and fraud. There is something else in Machiavelli's discussion of overcoming fortune – the clear-sightedness that is only possible with a type of humility eschewing the other-blind love of one's own, and identifying with another as with oneself (though this type of identification cannot lead to a secure love, because human love is fickle). With this predisposition, one can understand the violation of another person as a major transgression and imagine the import of the affront, sympathising with and recognising another's humiliation. One can also practice this humility by knowing when to tolerate offenses against one's own pride.

Brutus does both of these things, and this humility, along with his use of force and fraud, is what makes him greater than Romulus. He is Machiavelli's most unreservedly praised Roman, particularly for his pretended foolishness as the jester-like companion of the Tarquin brothers (Machiavelli, 1996, III.2). Machiavelli claims that Brutus is the most praiseworthy, and he should be imitated by anyone displeased with a prince. Emulating stupidity, to a man as proud of his intellect as Machiavelli,²⁰ must require tremendous strength of character even if it is for the sake of another good.

But what exactly is this other good? In Brutus, the reader truly begins to see Machiavelli's nuanced account of human motivation. While Livy solely attributes Brutus’ feigned idiocy to survival, when one considers the hero's ‘mode of proceeding…it can be believed that he also simulated this to be less observed to have more occasion for crushing the kings’ (Machiavelli, 1996: III.2).²¹ As evidence, Machiavelli cites Brutus’ sacrifice to Apollo and his proximity to Lucretia. According to Machiavelli, this nearness to the great rulers of the land enabled Brutus to throw off idiocy's cloak and free his people. Had he been in a more powerful position, open war would be best. But without that option, Brutus prudently assimilates to the Tarquins’ demeaning desires.

Machiavelli emphasizes that in an honour-driven culture Brutus endures denigration in exchange for the chance to overthrow Tarquin and not only to survive. Brutus decides it is better to wait in hope for freedom than to act with pride and enjoy the immediate gratification of receiving respect. To those who would say this is merely an example of self-interest (Augustine, 1998: II.17), Machiavelli points out another aspect of humility by stating that it is vicious to demure from politics. To someone who says the escape from politics is a sign of true humility because one evades honour's lure, Machiavelli responds that nobody of quality can avoid being induced into public service. The needs of the community are constantly visible, and the members of the community will continually turn to whomever they believe can deliver them. With contingency and need always present, a virtuous man cannot deny that his virtue might serve others. The only way out of service, Machiavelli (III.31) opines, is to feign madness until the time for service is right.²²

So, the ‘common benefit of all’, the motivation Machiavelli attributes to himself in the Discourses’ preface, does at least partially influence Brutus. He certainly enjoys the benefit of survival, but survival alone cannot explain his risk. He gains the benefit of honour, but he endures dishonour for a hope that might never materialise. A more nuanced account of Brutus’ motivation recognises his mixed motives, and that at least some of these motives grow out of a secularised humility. By this virtue, Brutus sustains himself, and by this virtue, he is reigned in: ‘For by such a mode, showing oneself always harsh to everyone and loving only the common good, one cannot acquire partisans’ (Machiavelli, 1996: III.22). Brutus and the city are preserved from hubris’ corruption by this detachment, and Brutus is psychologically able to commit great deeds for the city because of this virtue also.

Machiavelli's insight into Brutus's motivations is extremely Augustinian, and his solution to the problem of political injustice is partially Augustinian. Brutus forgets himself for the good of others because he is moved by others’ suffering. Humility allows him to feel compassion, and humility and compassion spur him onto sacrifice – first his character and honour, and then his sons. ‘Killing the sons of Brutus’ serves as Machiavelli's euphemism for ending corruption. On one level, it represents the end of hereditary rule. On another, it represents equality before the law. In one more sense, it ‘vitiates the arrogance of that would otherwise by instilled in its [the Republic's] men’ (Sullivan, 1996: 170). But in a final sense, killing the sons of Brutus means being able to kill what one loves. Machiavelli writes, tongue in cheek: ‘It is an example rare in all memory of things to see the father sit on the tribunals and not only condemn his sons to death but be present at their death’ (Machiavelli, 1996: III.3). Brutus does both of these things, and this humility, along with his use of force and fraud, is what makes him greater than Romulus (Machiavelli, 1996: III.2).

Machiavelli knows, however, that this is not an example rare in all of history; it is a Christian example that predominantly shapes his society. His choice of words could not be lost on his readers. By invoking the figure of the father overseeing his sons' pain, Machiavelli alludes to the Christian theory of the atoning crucifixion.²³ Brutus's experience is analogous in the sense that he punishes his sons for Rome's good and endures his sons' suffering for a greater good.²⁴ The greater good achieved by the Christian God's sacrifice is the salvation of the world; the greater good achieved by Brutus is the free state.

Brutus' form of humility is secularised; it is for the goal of the stability of political life. He endures the mocking of kings to free his country and forgets any distinction between his family's noble blood and the blood of Roman citizens. Humility enables him to sacrifice his bloodline through the death of his sons; understanding that while he is a leader and man of tremendous virtù, he cannot forsake the duty to the political community entailed by virtue, he sacrifices his happiness. This is in contrast to Soderini, whose humility is unguided by. For Soderini the virtue of humility mandates the practice of mercy and cannot be guided solely by its benefits. In contrast, Brutus's humility is governed by prudence, and this is the difference between the education of Brutus' time and Soderini's Christian education.

Another difference between Machiavelli's humility and Christian humility, as portrayed by Machiavelli, is that Brutus’ humility is directed towards the earthly good of his fellow citizens. He is a man who makes his excellence the excellence of a republic and refounds for freedom, giving up temporary honour and his sons. This observation leads to our final point on Machiavelli's Brutus. The Roman consul's life is incredibly miserable and he loses a great deal. His story of loss begins with the murder of his talented brother by the Tarquins and ends with his own death on the battlefield. This makes one wonder how being a founder is in one's own interest. ‘It is one thing to hold that politics might require moral crimes’, Coady (1993: 382) writes, ‘and quite another to insist that it involves a lifestyle which closes off certain morally attractive options’. Friendships and family ties are endangered by this form of virtù, but as Coady reminds us, all lifestyle choices require the precluding of some goods.

Another cost to this type of heroic life is that it does not save your soul, though it makes the lives of others secure. As Weber (1994: 366) writes, inspired by Machiavelli:

The great virtuosi of unworldly goodness and love for mankind,

… did not employ the means of politics, force.

… Anyone seeking to save his own soul and the souls

of others does not take the path of politics in order to reach

his goal, for politics has quite different tasks, namely those

which can only be achieved by force.

Though Machiavellian humility's content is different, the path of Machiavellian umanità is sacrificial. Though Augustine and Machiavelli may not agree on the object of sacrifice, as we will see, they are in agreement on the humane's need for sacrifice.

Augustine's Brutus

While Machiavelli focuses on Brutus's feigned madness and his sons’ execution, Augustine concentrates instead on the exile of Lucretia's husband and his own co-consul, Collatinus, and on the monstrosity of the execution of his sons. Uncovering ‘Augustine's strategies for the portrayal of evil, pride and self-suspicion’ helps to identify a main goal for Augustine as a thinker – reflecting on the disunity of the soul and the heart's hidden motives. Particularly in the City of God, Augustine inquires into the fragmented human will by comparing pagan virtue to Christian humility (Hundert, 1992: 87, 94). For Augustine, the primary problem posed by Brutus is the problem of pride, the corrupting effect of the libido dominandi on an extraordinary character.

Brutus himself takes a secondary position to the Roman heroes Lucretia and Regulus in the City of God. It seems that Augustine's Brutus is not even one of these half-virtuous heroes. Within the city of God, humility is the most important virtue. It is the perquisite for that greatest of Christian duties – latreia, the reserving of worship for what is divine, because substantial humility is required to understand that as creatures we worship the Creator alone, not ourselves or other created things. Latreia is a type of justice concerning God because it gives Him what He alone deserves, and from this, justice regarding others descends (Augustine, 1998: X.1,4). The most fitting worship of God (and hence the most just act) is the sacrifice of a contrite spirit and accompanying acts of mercy towards others, rooted in humility (Augustine, 1998: X.3, X.5, X.6).

For Augustine, the Romans’ prideful errors are therefore injustices, and Brutus is a foremost example of this pride. Though Brutus is able to sacrifice, he is unable to sacrifice humbly, nor is he able to sacrifice to the right end, the city of God. Augustine's demotion of Brutus speaks volumes, and if that is not dismissal enough, the bishop emphasizes how quickly this ‘great’ general died in battle after taking power, dimming the lustre of Brutus's death against (Augustine, 1998: III.16). A close reading of Livy's account of Brutus’ death shows us why Augustine lampoons his demise and what it teaches us about Rome's first consul. Livy (1912: II.76) tells us that when the son of Tarquin challenges Brutus to single combat the consul

eagerly accepted the challenge, and [the two] charged with such fury, neither of them thinking of protecting himself, if only he could wound his foe, that each drove his spear at the same moment through the other's shield, and they fell dying from their horses.

Brutus’ single-minded desire to overcome another characterises his death; this drive is what Augustine finds disturbing in Brutus’ great deeds. The manner of Brutus’ death shows that he desired more to preserve his position as ruler than to preserve his life. Instead of a hero who will sacrifice his family and life for the common benefit, Augustine suggests that Brutus risks all to dominate others. In Letter 138 to Marcellinus, Augustine depicts Christ's virtue as superior to Brutus and other Roman heroes, not only spiritually but also politically. According to Dodaro (2004: 204–205), the superiority of Christ's virtue is demonstrated in his ‘unique freedom from fear of death’. In contrast to Brutus’ death, Christ's death was motivated not by self-interest but through genuine mercy made possible by humility. Augustine's analysis of the motivations behind Lucretia and Cato's suicides (Hundert, 1992: 97), as well as his recasting of Brutus’ heroism, shows that these Roman exemplars did not others. Instead, they sacrifice because they grotesquely dwell on the tristitia that ‘so often motivated the idolatrous’, or because they seek glory as the only possibility for immortality (Hundert, 1992: 89).

In addition to emphasizing Brutus’ brief rule and shifting his motivation from sacrificial heroism to self-interest, the next substantive mention of Brutus is an analysis of his treatment of Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, his co-ruler, in a satirical litany disputing Sallust's statement that ‘justice and goodness prevailed among [the Romans] as much by nature as by law’ (Augustine, 1998: II.17). Is it by this justice and goodness, Augustine asks, that Brutus turned on Collatinus and forced him out of their shared rule? Brutus made Collatinus resign his consulship because as a cousin to Tarquin the Proud, he bore their family name. Augustine's account of Collatinus's dismissal retains the suspicion of Livy's account (1912, II.2), wherein Brutus manipulates an assembly through fear to expel Collatiunus:

He first of all rehearsed the people's oath, that they would suffer no man to

reign or to live in Rome by whom the public liberty might be imperiled…

Personal regard made him reluctant to speak, nor would he have

spoken had not his affection for the commonwealth compelled him. The Roman

people did consider that their freedom was not yet fully won; the royal race,

the royal name, was still there, not only amongst the citizens but in the government… Turning to his brother consul: ‘These apprehensions it is for you, L. Tarquinius,

to banish of your own free will. Go, as our friend, relieve the commonwealth from

a perhaps groundless, fear: men are persuaded that only with the family will

the tyranny of the Tarquins depart.

Livy's treatment of Collatinus' dismissal occurs in sharp contrast to Machiavelli's tacit approval of Brutus' decision to rule alone (Warner and Scott, 2011: 867). As Augustine mentions, Brutus's betrayal is especially vicious because he is in fact Tarquin's nephew. For pushing Collatinus out, Augustine (1998: III.16) calls Brutus impious, a general term for the greatest injustice against the true piety of latreia. Brutus is not pious like Regulus or mistaken like Lucretia, he is unjust because he is controlled by the desire to dominate, which causes him to instrumentalise others to achieve greater power. Collatinus is Brutus' victim, but the Roman people are also casualties of his desire for power. If it was truly the common benefit Brutus sought, he would have allowed Collatinus to rule with him as a good, innocent, and judicious man. Brutus cared less about the people of Rome than about the ability to dominate them unimpeded; Augustine calls the people just in their original decision to elevate Collatinus to office; they judge him by his goodness rather than by his heredity.

Augustine also casts doubt on Brutus’ marvellous execution of his sons, stating that what appears to be a sacrifice is rather an atrocity. Readers are delusional if they believe that Brutus’ act of justice originated from genuine virtue. As an interpreter of Virgil, Augustine notices the poet's use of two voices in his exultation of Brutus’ execution of his son (Galinsky, 2006: 10). The poet praises Brutus for his sacrifice but notes his unhappiness, as well as his duel motivations, writing, ‘but love of country drove him, and the immense love of praise’. According to Augustine, Titus and Tiberius stood in Brutus’ way, like Collatinus. Brutus’ love of country is overwhelmed by his love for praise, and this love induces Brutus to commit acts of domination, not acts of justice.

While the betrayal of Collatinus is problematic even for Livy, is there any way of construing Brutus’ superintending of his son's execution as a commitment to justice? If the law punished treason with death, could Brutus rightfully execute others while pardoning his sons? Augustine is less interested in Brutus’ standing under Roman law, as more interested in his intentions. In Augustine's view, their execution is the result of a love of domination, rather than of a commitment to justice requiring humility. Brutus is atrocious because he is willing to exile or kill others for the sake of praise and rule, rationalised as acts of sacrifice for the good of the state. In this way, Brutus's act resembles not only the theatrically aware self-sacrifices of Lucretia and Cato meant to earn praise from the public (Hundert, 1992: 97), but also resembles Rome herself, who sees in its imperial expansion a praiseworthy ability ‘to spare the humble and subdue the proud’ (Aenead 6, 853 qtd in Augustine, 1998: I. Preface). Rome rationalises deeds of self-glorification as deeds of mercy, instead of inquiring about what would be truly merciful and acting accordingly.

Here, we see a strange similarity between Machiavelli and Augustine's account of what it means to be humane – it is to consider the end of one's action. However, they disagree on what the humane action would be. Brutus’ murder of his sons could never be humane because it is a destruction of the bonds of family, and the bond between father and children is political life's fundamental bond. If he cannot preserve this bond in his household, how can he preserve the bond for the city? By publicly executing his children he symbolically rejects the understanding of politics based on the household, which Augustine believes is the most just and humane. As in Book I of Aristotle's Politics, Augustine compares the household to a small city. ‘From this’ he writes ‘it appears clearly enough that domestic peace has reference to civic peace: that is, that the ordered concord of domestic rule and obedience has reference to the ordered concord of civic rule and obedience’. A ruler is akin to a paterfamilias because he is responsible for not only the social order but the moral development of individual members. Reproving erring citizens is one of a ruler's first duties, but the reproof is intended for re-admittance into society (Augustine, 1998: XIX.16). Brutus is not humane as a father or as a ruler in the execution of his sons and his brothers-in-law after learning of the conspiracy against the republic; in fact, it seems that Rome's fratricidal origin is itself a fundamental violation of justice.

Brutus, like Rome then, is as far from being humane as he is from being humble. If he were humble, he would not dominate, and if he were humane, he would not seek to destroy the most fundamental bond of political life. Humility facilitates the clarity needed to identify what another's true good is, because it allows one to view situations through a lens other than self-interest, the lens of compassion or ‘misericordia’. Humility is the same thing as mercy for Augustine, and politics cannot be humane unless it begins in what is humble.

Humility's political consequences

Machiavelli and Augustine both agree that mercy should play a role in political judgment, but they disagree about what mercy entails. For both of them, to be merciful is to be humane, and a critical component of this humanity is a form of the virtue of humility. Augustine's Christian humility and Machiavelli's non-traditional account of humility both reflect their particular forms of normative realism. The humility of Machiavelli is a clear sightedness that is prepared to respond to facts on the ground. It is also a virtue that leads to the personal detachment necessary for sacrificing private goods and attachments for the sake of the republic. The humility of Augustine is also rooted in a conception of realism. Given humanity's proclivity to dark and unruly passions, the only antidote is a humility which restrains people from pridefully dominating others, chastened by a realistic assessment of men and women's finite and abilities and their place in the cosmos.

Contributing to their differing accounts of humility are their differing accounts of mercy. For both men, to be merciful is to be humane, but because of the different ends identified for political life, they conceive of mercy differently. Machiavelli famously writes to Vettori that he loves his city more than his soul (Machiavelli and Gilbert, 1988: 248); committing deeds Machiavelli considers merciful endangers one's soul because these deeds may transgress moral virtues. For Augustine, committing merciful deeds saves ones soul, because it encompasses all Christian moral virtues. The dichotomy between city and soul found in Machiavelli is absent from Augustine. Instead of a dichotomy, there is a hierarchy – insofar as what is required in the city is just, then it is synonymous with what it means to be just in one's heart.

The character of Brutus helps us to understand the transformation of humility from the Christians to the moderns through Machiavelli's hands. Our study would not be complete, however, without taking one step further in our comparison. Just as Machiavelli asks whether Christian humility leads to what is humane, the question should be posed to Machiavelli's politics, which though motivated by humanity, are not clearly effectively humane.

Machiavelli's best person must love something more than his own interest and in his depiction of himself and of Brutus we see this. It is in this sense, then, that we can say that Machiavelli's description of himself to Vettori is correct, and this type of love requires a humility leading to the willingness to sacrifice. But there is still a human cost – both for Brutus and for Rome. Augustine reminds us, quoting Vergil, that Brutus is infelix even while he is courageous and glorious. The verses Augustine invokes tell of Aeneas’ mystical vision of Rome's future, which encourages him with the glory Rome will eventually enjoy. But ‘as Augustine correctly perceived, Vergil had described the glorious future beheld by Aeneas as unthinkable without a heavy human cost’ (MacCormack, 1998: 196–197), a cost that all good students of Machiavelli must ponder.

It is also a cost that is difficult to countenance if one believes Machiavelli's insistence on the human need to acquire. Machiavelli (1985: Ch. IX) is often thought of as the philosopher of self-interest, and while it is clear that his institutions are predicated on the desire for acquisition, an anthropology of self-interest is incomplete as he does expect sacrifice. This addition to self-interest in Machiavellian anthropology is an important aspect of understanding his philosophy – though it is possible that it is not an undercurrent Machiavelli realises himself.

Finally, when considering Brutus's umanità, it is important to consider the possibility of finding a person able to use cruelty for mercy's sake. Turning violence on and off is almost as imaginary as the republics dismissed in the Prince. Machiavelli (1996: I.18.4) knows this when he writes,

Because the reordering of a city for a political way of life presupposes a

good man, and becoming prince of a republic by violence presupposes

a bad man, one will find that it very rarely happens that someone good

wishes to become prince by bad ways, even though his end be good, and

that someone wicked, having become prince, wishes to work well.

A similar difficulty is identified by Bernard Williams. If it is possible to find someone capable of such leadership, who will protect citizens from this person? If we accept that Machiavellian morality recognises that there are legitimate yet unsavoury political actions, then what is to prevent the secrecy and the strength characteristic of such government from turning its powers upon its people (Williams, 2002: 207, 2005: 157)?

There are reasons to think umanità might not be enough. Machiavelli offers an elaborate construction of checks he believes solve the problem of the need for a good ruler to order things; public accusations and the hero cult featured in Book III will periodically renew the republic. Such institutions, he admits, are vulnerable to corruption; in fact, a primary component of such corruption is a mistaken notion of humanity. ‘What people call umanità in corrupt times’, Benner (2009: 206) writes, ‘is really excessive indulgence of others for the sake of one's own private or partisan interests.’

Benner rightly thinks that the susceptibility of Machiavellian umanità is not reason for its dismissal, because an authentic umanità is still conceptually possible. But the problem of corruption penetrates more deeply than something that curable by recalling institutions to virtù, because the persuasion of private affections is commonplaces of the human condition. Perhaps this is the most realistic insight of all. As the conspiracy of the Roman matrons and the Bacchanalian conspiracy in Book III of the Discourses demonstrate,²⁵ strong desires always corrupt sound institutions, manifesting in behaviours that are against ones' interest and which cannot be co-opted into institutions. These desires are often tied to the emotions inspired by friends, lovers, ideologies, and religions.

Channelling Augustine, Keys (2013: 102, n. 38) writes: ‘Pride demotes or even severs these bonds, whereas humility acknowledges them gladly’. This insight is perhaps the greatest contribution Augustine offers to the tradition of political realism: a marker of a way forward, an answer to the question that at the end of the Discourses Machiavelli is unable to resolve. It is also an important concern to keep in mind as we engage in our own inquiries into the insights and developments of political realism.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

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