Perfect Courtier

Excerpt from baldassare castiglione the perfect courtier vol.

Perfect courtier. Overview of law 24. Play the perfect courtier in this chapter greene persuades us to be the perfect courier. He has mastered the art of indirection. He flatters yields to superiors and asserts power over others in the most oblique and graceful manner.

The employee is the modern courier and the employer is the modern king. Of course courts king and couriers are antiquated terms but the modern world is not without their equivalents. Play the perfect courtier in other words handle others perfectly when you look at the times of niccolo machiavelli and compare the basic works of power to today it s astonishing how little has changed in terms of the authority subordinate relationship. The perfect courtier thrives in a world where everything revolves around power and political dexterity.

Learn from the courtiers failures and successes and how you can play the perfect courtier and you can rise in any system. Principles of law 24. His life and letters 1478 1529 the modern revival of interest in the italian renaissance has naturally led students to turn once more to castiglione s courtier in whom they justly recognise the ideal representative of that great age.