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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Book One, The Development of Rome's Constitution, The Use and Abuse of Dictatorship, The Road to Ruin, Sundry Reflections Based on the Decemvirate.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What do fertile areas offer to those who settle there according to Machiavelli?
(a) Raw materials that can be sent to sterile areas for manufacturing and refinement.
(b) Resources that will sustain a growing population.
(c) The means by which a city can grow and have the ability to defend themselves.
(d) The ability to affect the economy of sterile areas.

2. What does Machiavelli claim causes ingratitude from a conquered citizenry?
(a) Taking conquered citizens into slavery.
(b) Taking the property of conquered citizens.
(c) When the conquerors remove freedoms that the citizens knew before being conquered.
(d) Treating conquered citizens harshly.

3. What is a Prince as Machiavelli uses the term?
(a) A monarch over a sovereign system of government and territory.
(b) A hereditary noble.
(c) A dispatched bureaucrat that carries out orders over a territory.
(d) An underling to the ruling authority.

4. How does Machiavelli expect a city can keep its freedom after a weak Prince follows an excellent Prince?
(a) Only if a Prince with the virtue of the excellent Prince follows the weak Prince.
(b) Only if administrators conspire to act with the virtue of the excellent Prince.
(c) Only if the city does not fall into war with a more virtuous city.
(d) Only if the citizens ignore the weak Prince and organize themselves to retain virtue.

5. What is Machiavelli's explanation for initiating his recommended approach with enemies against an empire?
(a) Because taking out the head of a movement will lead to the death of the body.
(b) Because the public humiliation of the enemy will expose supporters to the Citizens who will then act to neutralize the conspiracy.
(c) Because those who try to crush it, make its force greater, and make that evil which is suspected from it to be accelerated.
(d) Because putting the leaders of enemies in positions of public responsibility will require them to make decisions that will be rejected by conspiracies.

Short Answer Questions

1. What are the two important items that Machiavelli considers to be unwise for a Prince to put entirely into peril?

2. What are three reasons that Machiavelli gives for cities becoming unhappy?

3. How long did Sparta peacefully exist without changing its laws, according to Machiavelli?

4. How does Machiavelli recommend a Republic deal with enemies that spring up within an empire?

5. What did Machiavelli cite as the method that Rome used to maintain its freedom?

(see the answer key)

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