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Rh never lose sight of this maxim, "Either make a man your friend, or put it out of his power to be your enemy." They may revenge slight injuries, but great ones deprive them of the power of doing so. Hence the injury done to a man ought to be such that the prince can have nothing to dread from his vengeance.

But if instead of colonies he retains large bodies of troops, his expences are infinitely greater, and the whole revenue of the country is consumed in the single purpose of maintaining peaceable possession, so that the prince loses, rather than gains by his conquest. The wrongs which he does are so much the greater, as they extend indiscriminately to all his subjects, who are perpetually harassed by the marches, the lodging, and subsistence of his troops. These inconveniences being universally felt, all become his enemies, and dangerous enemies too; for though defeated, they remain in possession of their homes. Hence, on every account, this military force is just as prejudicial as the colonies which we have proposed are advantageous.

The new sovereign of a country, remote as well as different from his own, ought to take care and make himself the protector and chief, of the weaker neighbouring princes, and to curb and lessen the authority of the more powerful. He ought especially, in every possible case, to prevent the