Niccolò Machiavelli on guns

Occasionally words must serve to veil the facts. But this must happen in such a way that no one becomes aware of it; or, if it should be noticed, excuses must be at hand, to be produced immediately.

There are three kinds of intelligence: one kind understands things for itself, the other appreciates what others can understand, the third understands neither for itself nor through others. This first is excellent, the second good, and the third useless.

For the great majority of mankind are satisfied with appearances as though they were realities. and are often more influenced by things that seem than by those that are.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

Dwight D. Eisenhower1890–1969The Chance for Peace (1953)

• War & Peace

War can only be abolished through war, and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to take up the gun.

Mao Zedong1893–1976“Problems of War and Strategy”, 1938.

• War & Peace

I’m all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let’s start with typewriters.

Frank Lloyd Wright1867–1959

• Writing