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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Machiavelli identify as tactics the Citizen seeking not to be harmed uses?
(a) Friendships with Citizens who are bold enough to fight.
(b) Obscurity.
(c) The financial ability to buy protection.
(d) Acquiring friendships either through honest means or by supplying money to protect themselves from the powerful (bribes).

2. Who were the Decemvirs?
(a) Ten citizens created by the Roman people to make the laws in Rome.
(b) Courtiers who gathered around the Caesars to protect them during times of festivals.
(c) The 12 Nobles who the Caesars appointed to help him manage the Empire.
(d) Officials who took their power in the last month of the year.

3. Why does Machiavelli suggest wars should be quick with limited damage to the conquered City?
(a) To reduce the cost to the conquering Prince and preserve the resources of the conquered city as booty for the conquering forces.
(b) So armies can be readied for the next war.
(c) So Citizens are not burdened by the demands of the war.
(d) So armies can be brought home to participate in a productive economy.

4. What did Machiavelli report led gatherings of people to make laws?
(a) To avoid evils that people committed on others.
(b) To protect economic activity that benefited the city.
(c) To set order to the defense of the city.
(d) So resources could be justly distributed.

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

Short Answer Questions

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

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

3. What should the reader consider as evil when Machiavelli is advising Princes to "recognize evils".

4. What does Machiavelli believe will come of agreements made by force?

5. According to Machiavelli, what is the first thing that Citizens seek when starting on the path of chasing their ambitions?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Machiavelli report that the Roman Senate decided to pay a public stipend to the soldiers in the army?

2. Why did Machiavelli consider the naming of a Caesar (dictator) over Rome was beneficial to the Empire?

3. What kind of Prince does Machiavelli consider to be weak?

4. What does Machiavelli claim to be the practice of writers of history who, "...so obey the fortune of the winners...?"

5. What two methods did Machiavelli identify that Roman Nobility drew honor from the Plebes?

6. In the title of Book 1, Section 8, what does Machiavelli mean with the phrase, "...so much so calumnies are pernicious...?"

7. Why does Machiavelli consider a Citizen rising to take authority through irregular means (popular uprising) harmful in a Republic?

8. What are the reasons that Machiavelli gives for people who leave their home country for another out of necessity?

9. Why does Machiavelli advise that a Prince "temporize" a perceived evil in his State?

10. What are the two reasons that Machiavelli gives for his opinion that the courts (Faculty of Accusing) are the most necessary and useful authority to guard liberty in a City?

(see the answer keys)

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